You'll Never Be Confident

Confidence.

One of the most sought after and coveted traits in today's society.

It’s basically the end all be all solution to every self improvement, better your life, and conquering the world article out there.

When people look up and try to find out ways to be more comfortable and confident with themselves, you get generic responses like “fake it until you make it” or “just pull your shoulders back and walk in a room like you own the place.”

And I hate EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. OF THESE. RESPONSES.

They sound nice and dandy, but this advice is actually very unhelpful.

You want to know why?

These aren’t concrete steps that actually teach you how to be confident. It actually has nothing to do with confidence whatsoever.

Confidence isn’t something you can just put on or pretend to be, because confidence is an action. It’s the feeling or belief that one can rely on someone or something.

It’s firm trust.

CONFIDENCE IS TRUST IN YOURSELF

So it doesn’t matter how many times you try to fake it or pretend, if you don’t actually have trust for yourself, you’ll never gain any true confidence. Confidence is all about believing in who you are and your capabilities, and having faith that you can present yourself and execute in a way that can get you through whatever.

So how do you build your trust in yourself to actually become confident?

3 ways to actually build confidence

Be Intentional/Have a Goal

What many of us don’t know, is that confidence is actually a secondary emotion. Just like anger, it takes a previous thought or emotion to make you feel that way.

For example, if a friend does something behind your back, you’re never angry at them for the sake of being angry, you're angry at them because you felt betrayed.

You were betrayed first, then you got angry for being betrayed.

If something embarrassing happens because of a careless worker or family member and you get angry. You’re not angry at them for the sake of being angry, you’re angry because you first felt embarrassed. And to mask that embarrassment, or for causing you to feel embarrassed, you got angry.

It’s the same with confidence. That’s why it’s so hard to pinpoint exactly what you need to do to feel confident.

When someone walks into a room and they feel self assured and say they feel confident, they aren’t confident for no reason. They’re self assured, which results in them feeling confident.

When someone is trying to be sexy and they aren’t afraid of being sexy and they’re perceived as confident, it’s because they had a goal to be sexy and executed that goal, which resulted in them being confident about their performance of embodying sex appeal.

Confidence is a secondary emotion that is only felt as a result of your intention of what to be and your execution of being that thing coming into alignment.

Be specific.

You have to set goals and intentions for what you want to be.

Don’t say when you walk into a room you want to feel confident, because confidence is a secondary result to you being something else first.

Do you want to be bold, seen, creative, alluring, humorous?

Be more specific about how exactly you want to show up in the world and try to move according to that. When you come into alignment with that, the resulting effect is you feeling confident.

Practice and Prepare

Has anyone else’s dad always taught them to live by the 5 P’s?

Proper preparation prevents poor performance.

This philosophy doesn’t only apply to when you have a project or meeting or test. Practicing and preparing can apply to every aspect of your life.

If you actually prep yourself for any event or interaction, you’ll have a plan of how you want to show up before you even enter the space. And if you have a plan that you’ve practiced and you know like the back of your hand, you’ll have more trust in yourself that you can show up the way you want because you’ve been practicing it.

Whether that’s practicing walking up straight and tall for a few minutes a day, or being aware to practice eye contact with anyone you interact with on a daily basis. Because you’ve done it before multiple times, your body and mind will be more readily acclimated to be able to execute it when you need it most. And you’ll have more confidence going in.

Instead of faking it until you make it, actually practice and prepare for what it is you want or have to do or be.

Visualization

Now you may be thinking that some things are hard to practice, like how you want to come off to people or how you want to be when you enter a room. Or how you may want to feel when you walk into a certain space.

One exercise that can help with this is visualization. When you visualize, you’re taking the time to imagine yourself in that situation.

Imagine how you look, what you walk like and how you feel. This takes practice too.

I want you to visualize the whole interaction and try to conjure up the feelings you want to feel while in the interaction. Do this multiple times a day. This way, in your mind, you can practice and get familiar with actually feeling the feelings you want to feel and embodying confidence, so it’s an easier feeling to embody when you need it.

Usually, a lack of confidence arises out of feelings of inferiority. You may feel embarrassed, or like you’re not good enough.

The only way to healthily combat inferiority is not to fake it or put up this facade, it’s to improve in the places that you feel you are lacking.

First, you must define what confidence means for you. Then if you want to be confident, and let’s say part of being confident for you is talking to people with more ease, then you need to improve your conversation skills in order to be more confident.

If you want to feel more confident in the way that you look, then you don’t need to go out and buy the latest fashion or put on the most insane makeup. You just need to study yourself. Put together staple outfits that look good on you and wear go-to makeup that makes you feel presentable and compliments your style.

If you want to feel more confident when talking to the opposite sex, then you need to first pinpoint exactly what it is that makes you feel uncomfortable with the opposite sex.

Is it your looks? Do you not think you’re interesting enough? Are you worried you won’t have good conversation?

Then you need to practice improving those things to a good skill level that makes you feel like you can do them with ease. The ending result is you’ll feel confident when you have to perform.

Start learning about, and tailoring, the information you consume to things that are interesting and share that on your dates. Look up good conversation starters before hand so you can go in with material for when there’s dead air. Work on looking your best and and wearing things that actually compliment you.

And understanding that someone not FINDING you attractive is MUCH DIFFERENT then you not actually BEING attractive.

You should be striving to be the best version of you every single day, because that’s the only competition you have in life. And when you can become a version of you that you love, trust, and enjoy, then confidence will follow tenfold.