Boost Self Confidence

1. an introduction to the life-changing formula that will transform your life.Self-esteem isn't everything, it's just that there's nothing without it. - Gloria Steinem First, develop self-awareness: know yourself, acknowledge that there are aspects of yourself that you wish to change, and understand what has stopped you feeling confident so far. Then apply the I-T-I-A Formula:1. Assert your intention to be confident, and make a commitment. 2. Change .....

How confident are you

2. Defining your starting point.If you deliberately plan to be less than you are capable of being, then I warn you that you will be unhappy for the rest of your life. You'll be evading your own capabilities, your own possibilities. - Professor Abraham MaslowYour self-image – the way you see yourself – is made up of three core feelings and beliefs: 1. Self-worth: the value you place on yourself – how comfortable you are being you and the extent .....

Sow the seeds of confidence and watch them grow

3. why you are the way you are and how you can become what you want to be.And tomorrow only a vision But today well lived makes Every yesterday a dream of happiness And every tomorrow a vision of hope Look well therefore to this day. - Traditional Indian Poem What you sow you reap is a time-honoured truism. If you plant an acorn in moist, fertile soil, it will grow into a mighty oak. It can't help it, it's genetically programmed that way. Similarly, .....

Whose responsibility is your confidence

4. Why, yours, of course! For any of us to be truly free, we must first be willing to be responsible for our lives. - David McNallyOnly one person can build your confidence – guess who? That's right, you. If you don't do it, who will? It will only happen if you make a firm commitment, set goals, plan a strategy and take action. All of this means accepting full responsibility for yourself – deciding to be confident and refusing to allow anyone to .....

Getting motivated

5. setting goals which give you the impetus to change and to grow.To change one's life: Start immediately. Do it flamboyantly. No exceptions. No excuses. - Professor William JamesBuilding confidence takes time, patience and effort. You will have to take a few risks. At times you will feel anxious. How can you motivate yourself to put up with the discomfort and persevere? We humans are motivated by: 1. A want or need which induces tension. Only if .....

Determination

6. identifying the reasons to change, and reinforcing your commitment to be confident.If you head towards your goal with courage and determination, all the powers of the universe will come to your aid. - Ralph Waldo Emerson Determination is perhaps the quality that underpins all success. No one gets very far without it. If you've lacked confidence for years it won't change overnight without determination on your part. Every choice you make – incl .....

Thinking like a confident person

7. you start transforming your life by changing the way you think.Unless there be correct thought, there cannot be any action, and when there is correct thought, right action will follow. - Henry George Now it's time to take a close look at how you think. As the greatest and wisest teachers have always taught, improving the quality of your thoughts improves your life almost immediately: 1. The Bible quotes King Solomon: 'As a man thinketh, so shal .....

The Four Step Method

8. a cast iron way to become a positive thinker.Choose your own thoughts. Don't let anyone else choose them for you. - David Lawrence PrestonNegative thinking can quickly spiral out of control and destroy your confidence if you allow it. This is where The Four Step Method – a simple technique for becoming aware of disempowering thoughts – comes in. It's quickly learned and easily applied and, with practice, soon becomes second nature. The four .....

Silencing the Inner Critic

9. challenging the little voice in your head that loves to criticise you.Don't be afraid of your negative thoughts: just know them for what they are – not the truth, just negative thoughts. Give them no house room in your consciousness and they will dissolve into what they are – false ideas, false concepts, with nothing to sustain them. - Nona Coxhead The Inner Critic is that pernicious little voice inside your head that constantly carps, compla .....

Affirmations

10. how to use them to build confidence and the difference they make.When we change our attitude towards ourselves, everything else changes as well, for our life is a reflection of the way we feel inside. - Dr Mansukh Patel Affirmations are a form of self-suggestion – a kind of sound-byte you give to yourself. You're using affirmations every moment whether you know it or not. You're affirming and creating your life experiences with every word and t .....

Who do you imagine yourself to be

11. self-image and the subconscious.To come from no voice, no power, and to be able to achieve what I have means that only my own personal vision holds me back. - Oprah Winfrey Our imagination will stretch to any scenario, but people lacking in confidence usually imagine themselves as failures. They do not realise that they cannot succeed at anything if they cannot imagine themselves doing so. How you imagine yourself may bear no relation to the tru .....

Getting the most from creative imagery

12. life-transforming techniques which change your self-image permanently.First I dream my painting. Then I paint my dream. - Vincent Van Gogh Creative imagery is the process of consciously creating a mental image or impression as a means of influencing the all-important subconscious mind. Techniques for creative imagery are best used when the body is relaxed and the mind is calm. They are also effective whenever you feel naturally dreamy, such as f .....

The As If Principle

13. acting as if you're confident to become more confident.Assume a virtue if you have it not. - William Shakespeare When you speak and act confidently – even if it's all a pretence – you feel more confident. Others assume you're confident and treat you accordingly, which reinforces your behaviour and makes you feel even more confident. The opposite is also true. If you speak and act timidly, others assume you are timid and treat you as such, wh .....

Eat an elephant

14. the importance of taking it one step at a time.Try a thing you haven't tried before three times: once to get over the fear, once to find out how to do it, and a third time to find out if you like it or not. - Virgil ThomsonHow do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. How do you climb a ladder? One rung at a time. How do you build confidence? One step at a time. Whatever we learn to do, we learn by doing it. Change makes most of us feel uncomf .....

Self awareness the past

15. examining how the past has affected you and what's been holding you back.Knowing others is intelligence.Knowing yourself is true wisdom.Mastering others is strength.Mastering yourself is true power. - Lao TsuEverything is a result of what's gone before. Your level of confidence is mainly the result of the way you responded to those who raised you and the environment in which you grew up. But it is not the whole story. Genetics – nature – acc .....

Self awareness what are you like

16. Understanding yourself – the more self-aware you are, the more control you have over your life.Know yourself, know your enemy, A hundred battles, a hundred victories. - Mao Tse-Tung Confidence and self-esteem do not come in fixed amounts – they vary from place to place, moment to moment according to what you're doing and with whom. For example, some people are extremely confident at work but fail in their relationships; and many brilliant ind .....

Childhood

17. how your conditioning and your relationship with your parents as a child continue to affect you.Children begin by loving their parents. After a time they judge them. Rarely, if ever, do they forgive them. - Oscar Wilde Your self-image began to take shape even before you left the cradle and was pretty well established by the time you reached the age of 8. By then, on average, you had already received over 70,000 negative dictates: 'Don't do that' .....

Control dramas

18. how you learned to get what you wanted from others, and how it still governs your behaviour.No matter what kind of journey we make of life, where we started out will always be part of us. But only part. - Sir Alex FergusonControl dramas come in four types. Most of us have a favoured style, and adopt others from time to time according to circumstances: 1. Intimidator 2. Interrogator 3. Aloof 4. Poor me Understanding control dramas is extremel .....

Take care of your Inner Child

19. learning to accept the child you once were as an important part of the adult you.Whatever our upbringing has been, as adults our self-esteem is in our own hands. - Dr Nathaniel Branden The child you once were lives on inside you, influencing every thought, every emotion, every move. You're with each other every minute of the day. Many people are in adult bodies but they still react like children, still attached to their parents, never having brok .....

Forgive forget and be free

20. how to forgive those who have hurt you, take charge of your life and move on.If you haven't forgiven your parents, you haven't left home. - AnonNo matter how you feel about it, as an adult you are totally responsible for the way you respond to everything that happens. Thinking otherwise just keeps you stuck in a victim pattern. Confidence and inner peace will only be yours when you stop blaming and practise forgiveness. Who is there to forgive? .....

Let go of the past

21. how to get rid of unwanted baggage from the past so it no longer affects you.You can't have a better tomorrow if you are thinking about yesterday all the time. - Charles F. Kettering The past lives on only in your thoughts. It is dead, but you're not. You'll grow in confidence only if you are willing to let go of the past, learn from it, and move on. No matter what has gone before, your future, and how you feel about it, will be a direct result .....

Self acceptance

22. accepting yourself as you are, especially those things you cannot change.Never grow old in your mind. Your true age is how you feel inside. - Valerie J. Hayward Self-acceptance means acknowledging that you are as you are and being comfortable with it. It doesn't necessarily mean liking every aspect of yourself. Some attributes can't be changed, and you may as well accept them right now. Take your age. You can disguise it, lie about it, try to hi .....

Body image

23. love your body, warts and all!If we are embarrassed about our bodies, we should remember that kings and philosophers shit, and so do ladies. - Michel Montaigne What do you think of your body? Do you like it? Do you wish it were different in some way? If so, it may surprise you to discover that you're in the great majority. Most of us don't particularly like our bodies and could produce a lengthy list of 'faults'quite easily. Few people conform to .....

Get in shape

24. a health and fitness guide to give you more energy and more confidence.A vigorous walk will do more for an unhappy but otherwise healthy adult than all the medicine and psychology in the world. - Paul Dudley White Getting in shape physically is a wonderful way of building your confidence and self-image. It's not easy to feel confident if you're overweight, and exhausted after climbing a flight of stairs. Health and fitness are just like any other .....

Calmness and confidence

25. deep relaxation and instant calmness for instant confidence.If you are committed to your personal growth, you must have some quiet time to yourself every day. “Make it a priority. - David Lawrence Preston Calmness and confidence are very closely related, and they start with physical relaxation. When your body is relaxed, your mind is calmer and clearer, you are more in control of your emotions and better able to relate to others. Physical relax .....

Anchoring

26. how to produce confident feelings any time you wish.People tell me I'm lucky, but I've noticed the harder I practise, the luckier I get. - Gary Player Anchoring is a way of drawing on past experiences in which you felt confident to help you cope better in the present. It's another powerful weapon in your confidence armoury. An anchor is any stimulus that consistently triggers an emotion. To use an anchor you have to: 1. Generate in yourself the .....

Find a purpose

27. one that inspires and motivates you, and gives your life meaning and direction.We act as though comfort and luxury are the chief requirements of life, when all that we need to make us really happy is something to be enthusiastic about. - Charles Kingsley How would you feel if everything you were ever going to be, you are right now? If everything you are going to achieve, you have already achieved? Life would be pretty meaningless, wouldn't it? T .....

Goals revisited

28. consider what you wish to achieve in life, and get started right away.That's not worthy of you. You came here to make a major contribution to life on this planet. - Paul Solomon Practical goals build confidence and put you more in control of your life. When you set yourself a goal, even if you've never thought about it before, you unleash powerful mental forces. You accomplish more, often much more. Even if all you did was write down a goal and f .....

The Thinker thinks and the Prover proves

29. how to draw on the power of the subconscious mind to build confidence.Argue for your limitations, and they're yours. - Richard Carlson Most thoughts come from the subconscious, that hive of mental activity that lies below the threshold of momentary awareness. You cannot prevent a thought floating up from the subconscious; this is beyond your conscious control. However, you can always choose whether to accept, reject or ignore a thought, whether .....

Confident self talk

30. changing negative, restrictive thinking patterns to thoughts of confidence and self-worth.If you keep on saying things are going to be bad, you have a good chance of being a prophet. - Isaac Bashevis Singer When you think like a confident person, you automatically feel more confident and act more confidently. Makes sense, doesn't it? Confident self-talk includes any language that helps you feel better and cope more easily. Words and sentences tha .....

Beliefs

31. what they are, why they're important, how to change them and create self-belief.Men often become what they believe themselves to be. If I believe I cannot do something, it makes me incapable of doing it. When I believe I can, I acquire the ability to do it even if I didn't have it in the beginning. - Mahatma Gandhi A belief is a collection of thoughts that we accept as true. Most of our beliefs have their origins in childhood conditioning and our .....

Confident attitudes

32. seven attitudes of confidence for you to make your own.Nothing is good or bad, but thinking makes it so. - William Shakespeare Attitudes and beliefs, while closely related, are not exactly the same. A belief is a thought or mental image we accept as true. An attitude is what you put out into the world through your words and actions. For example, a belief such as 'I'm not good enough'will manifest in your speech and behaviour. That's when it beco .....

Self love

33. self-worth, the key to happiness and fulfilling relationships.It's a funny thing about life: if you refuse to accept anything less than the best, you very often get it. - W. Somerset Maugham Some people think it's a sin to love yourself. They consider those who love themselves to be selfish, conceited and rather unpleasant. But they're mistaken. They confuse self-love with false pride and narcissism which is quite a different matter. Vanity and a .....

Concentrating on what you do well

34. identifying your strengths, acquiring new personal qualities.It is all too obvious that in the great majority of human beings, the greater part of their possibilities, whether physical or spiritual, intellectual or aesthetic, remains unrealised. - Sir Julian Huxley To enjoy a better life you must focus on your potential, not your limitations, and concentrate on what you do well. You must make the most of your natural aptitudes and abilities. Of .....

Overcoming weaknesses

35. building on your strengths. The importance of concentrating on what you do well, and cultivating patience and persistence.Nothing stops the man (sic) who desires to achieve. Every obstacle is simply a course to develop his achievement “muscle. It's a strengthening of his power of accomplishment. - Eric Butterworth Weaknesses come in three types: 1. Important traits which can be worked on, perhaps even eliminated if you want to and are willing .....

Take a risk

36. how to get out of your comfort zone.Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, magic and power in it. Begin it now. - Goethe To build confidence you will occasionally have to push yourself to do things you don't feel like doing and put yourself on the line. Welcome every opportunity. Avoiding fresh challenges, difficult people and awkward situations is never gratifying in the long term and just keeps you stuck as you ar .....

Just do it

37. sure-fire confidence building activities. Go on – have a go!It is not the mountain that we conquer, but ourselves. - Sir Edmund HillaryWhy do most of us find it hard to put ourselves on the line? Usually because we're frightened of showing ourselves up. Overcoming these fears takes a rewriting of your self-talk and questioning your beliefs. With high self-esteem we don't worry about making fools of ourselves in front of others because we know t .....

Confident body language

38. adopt a confident posture and you feel more confident. You project confidence too.No one has ever seen a cock crow with its head down. - Alonzo Newton Benn When you move confidently and carry your body confidently, you not only feel more confident but others assume that you are. You may be surprised to learn that only 7% of the information you transmit to others is in the language you use. The remainder comes from: 1. 38% How you speak – qual .....

Conditions of worth

39. how others assess you. and how to deal with rejection.No one can make you feel inferior without your consent. - Eleanor Roosevelt The link between confidence and self-esteem and your relationships is two-way: 1. Your relationships with others, both past and present, help determine your confidence. 2. As your confidence and self-esteem grow, your relationships improve. People lacking in self-esteem often measure their worth in terms of other pe .....

Give up approval seeking behaviour

40. there's only one person whose approval you really need – guess who?We can secure other people's approval if we do right and try hard, but our own is worth a hundred of it. - Mark Twain Approval-seeking behaviour implies going along with what you think others expect out of fear that they won't like you. It means being excessively concerned with what others think. Obviously there is nothing wrong with wanting to be liked and accepted; it's a nat .....

First impressions

41. conversational skills that make others want to talk to you, and allow you to be confident.We often pardon those who bore us, but never those whom we bore. - Duc De La Rochefoucauld First impressions last. We make up our minds about other people very quickly. We form 90% of our opinions about others in the first four minutes, so it's vital you think about how you present yourself to others. The next few sections are about communicating with other .....

Be a good listener

42. good listening is one of the secrets of confident communication and popularity.The Chinese verb to listen is composed of five characters meaning ear, you, eyes, individual attention, heart. The art of listening involves all of our being. - Lynda Field The art of good communication can be summarised in four points: 1. Be a good listener so you truly understand what others say to you. Good listening earns genuine respect and admiration, and is one .....

Stand up for yourself

43. introduction to assertiveness.Too often our behaviour is dictated by obligation to others; in the process, we forget the primary obligation: to be ourselves. - Arthur Miller Standing up for yourself – assertiveness – means expressing yourself clearly, staying true to your needs and values, while at the same time respecting the dignity of others. Assertiveness is not to be confused with arrogance, rudeness and being unrealistic in your expect .....

How to be assertive

44. effective tools and techniques for standing your ground and getting your point across.This above all: to thine own self be true. And it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man. - William Shakespeare Even if you've never considered yourself to be assertive, mastering a few basic techniques soon starts to reap untold rewards. 1. Decide to become more assertive. 2. Think like an assertive person, and think of you .....

Saying no when you mean no

45. one of the hardest things to do when you lack confidence.If we want to feet truly confident, we must break the habit “of trying to please all people, all of the time. - Gael Lindenfield Assertive people find it easy to say no when they mean no. They don't worry about being seen in a bad light. They know that just because they've been asked doesn't mean they're under any obligation. Passive people, on the other hand, usually find it hard to refu .....

Compliments and criticism

46. how to handle criticism and give and receive compliments.What you think of me is none of my business. - Terry Cole-Whittaker Wouldn't it be wonderful to go through life without ever being criticised? Perhaps, but this is not possible. Employers, spouses, children, parents, friends and colleagues will all criticise you from time to time. You probably can't stop them, but you can learn to handle it. Your attitude to criticism is heavily influenced .....

How to ask for what you want

47. and what to say when you don't get it.The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it. - Michelangelo Many people find it difficult to ask for what they want or to complain about poor service even when they are fully justified. They think it's impolite. They don't like upsetting people, or worry they might be met with hostility. They prefer to 'put up and shut up'. Why? The .....

Lighten up

48. stop taking yourself too seriously and have a laugh.Angels fly because they take themselves lightly. - Alan Watts People who lack confidence often take themselves very seriously. They take offence easily and quickly get defensive. They rise to the bait when someone pokes fun at them. You can easily spot such people – they're usually on their own! It's impossible to laugh and feel anxious at the same time, and the less anxious, the more confide .....

Emotional intelligence

49. understanding and managing your emotions; and relating to other people's in an appropriate manner.Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, Courage to change the things which should be changed, And the wisdom to know the difference. - Reinhold Niebuhr Emotional intelligence is central for high self-esteem, confidence and assertiveness. It has two aspects, which are equally important: 1. Self-awareness: an understanding of, and .....

Take an interest in others

50. helping others does wonders for your own confidence.When we seek to discover the best in others, we somehow bring out the best in ourselves. - William Arthur Ward Every one of us can look back upon people who have made a huge impact on our lives. They could be teachers, relatives, work colleagues or friends. Perhaps they simply set an example, or did something practical just because they cared. They didn't expect anything in return and probably d .....

Choose peace

51. becoming aware of your spiritual dimension and enjoying continual peace of mind.We can cope with anything if we have the tools and can draw on our inner power. But there is no sun without rain; no joy without spiritual awareness; and no growth without the knowledge that help is always available and we can deal with life's difficulties. - Joy WardDeep inside, at our very core, lies a natural centre of absolute stillness and peace which can bring a .....