Plug into your self-confidence!

Does a lack of confidence or belief in yourself hold you back in life? Does self-consciousness stop you enjoying yourself? Does self-doubt hinder your relationships or your career?

Self-confidence is one of the most important things you can nurture in life. Self-confidence reflects your assessment of your own self-worth. It will play a large part in determining your happiness and success through life.

How would your life and relationships improve with more self-confidence? What would having high self-esteem mean to you? What would you feel free to do with your life?

   The secret to inner happiness

Self-confidence means being self-assured and showing self-reliance. Developing self-confidence underlies all our lives. It's the secret to inner happiness and success. Consider this - are the people you know who have successful careers more talented or intelligent than your less successful friends? Probably not! It’s important to realise that it’s not intelligence or ability that gives birth to success. It’s confidence! Confidence to have vision, goals, ambition, motivation and the confidence in yourself to put your goals in motion.

Self-confidence improves all aspects of life. It can make the difference between choosing an inappropriate relationship and having the self-esteem to choose the right partner for yourself. It can mean the difference between finding yourself indoors on a Friday night and having a wide and active social life.

What would your life be like? What would you be able to accomplish? Confident people are fun, energising and uplifting to be around. Just imagine that you close your eyes and woke up one morning feeling confident about yourself! What would life be like for you? Perhaps feeling confident would mean:

   What causes a lack of confidence or low self-esteem?

A lack of confidence can sometimes be a temporary state, where, perhaps, life experiences have taken their toll – perhaps an unexpected redundancy or the end of a relationship. It would be natural to feel temporarily down or uncertain in our lives in these circumstances. However, mostly we bounce back and regain that confidence after a short period of time.

Sometimes these situations seem to go on longer than desirable and the feeling of a lack of confidence spirals. Some people are dogged by a lack of confidence and low self-esteem and it seems to have been that way as far back as they can remember. A lack of self-worth, confidence and self-esteem seem in these cases to go hand-in-hand.

The way in which we behave in the world is indicative of our underlying beliefs. A lack of confidence or low self-esteem belies your self beliefs. For example, a belief such as “I am not good enough” would produce low self-esteem and little confidence as opposed to the belief of “I’m talented and have much to offer this world”. Such beliefs will have been formed at some time in the past, usually during childhood. These beliefs will have been formed during an intense or emotional time, for example, sometimes an angry parent or schoolteacher may have said “you’re very bad” and the child took this literally within the unconscious mind.

Our beliefs govern our behaviours and attitudes, so, if you grew up with a belief that you’d fail or you weren’t good enough, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Equally, if you grew up with a belief that you’re intelligent and successful, it too becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Our thoughts trigger our emotions and our bodily response to those thoughts. Every thought you have, whether positive or negative, releases chemicals from the brain which pass through the body like messengers. These messengers tell the body whether the thought is negative or positive and the body responds appropriately. That is, if the thought is one of “I can’t do this” the body will follow the self-talk. Your body and your nervous system are literally eavesdropping on your inner dialogue.

Self-confidence is knowing that you have the ability to do whatever you wish to do and then actually doing it. It is also the ability to know that, when faced with a challenge, you’ll do just fine and things will be ok. Imagine what it would feel like if you had the confidence to set yourself a goal and then actually achieve that goal. Confidence breeds confidence! The more you feel and behave with confidence, the more belief you have in yourself, and vice versa.