How confident are you? Are you comfortable in your own skin - do you believe in yourself? Or do you need to work on your confidence and feel paralysed by your lack of it?
Real Confidence
Real Confidence is the first in a new book series by Psychologies magazine, delving deep into the world of confidence. Try these top tips to start giving your confidence a boost today.
Assess yourself
Forget thinking that you need confidence, but focus on what it is that you want or need to do. Any time you feel a bit wobbly and sense yourself falling into 'I'm hopeless, I can't do this' territory, stop, detach yourself from your emotions and assess where you are, where you need to be and what you need to learn.
Keep learning
Regardless of what you want to become confident at, any learning has a spin-off effect. Instead of dwelling on a lack of confidence at work, take courses in something that interests you outside of work. The combination of pursuing a passion and engaging your brain will give you a happier energy, and increased confidence.
Develop your willpower
You may wonder about that person who lacks confidence yet is somehow able to achieve their goals. The answer is willpower. Rather than focussing on not having confidence, switch your thinking to how much you want something and what could happen when you get it. Let's say you lack the confidence to go running, but really want to complete a charity marathon. Focussing your motivation on that will give you the willpower to start running and slowly work towards the marathon.
Talk about your positive experiences
Do you spend more time talking about how you made a mess of things or what you can't do? Try and switch from this habit to talking about something which was even a tiny achievement. Rather than going over and over how rubbish you are, talking about the process of trying and making small progress is a habit that will help you make greater progress.
Tone down your worst thoughts
Being real means accepting how you feel. So if you feel terrible then that's where you are, but you don't have to stay there. 'I'm going to be a disaster when I pitch for business and then I'll get the sack', can be toned down to 'I might not be brilliant, but my boss knows this is my first time and will make allowances.' Modifying your thoughts is more manageable than a radical change.
Ditch thinking for doing
We're not going to pretend that how anyone feels about themselves is going to change overnight. When you have wobbly moments, you need to get out of your head. As soon as you become aware of overthinking, start doing something. Next time you start to feel yourself worrying, go for a walk or try some gardening instead.
Adopt good posture
A recent study led by Professor Amy Cuddy found that power poses (opening up our bodies rather than closing down) change our hormones so we are less reactive to stress. Just two minutes of opening up and stretching arms out zaps tension and boosts confidence. Rather than trying to change your posture during a stressful situation, develop the habit of becoming aware of your posture on a daily basis.
Real Confidence: Stop feeling small and start being brave by Psychologies is published by Capstone and is available now. http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0857086596.html)