5 Ways To Help Boost Your Confidence/Self-Esteem

Self-confidence is defined as a feeling of trust in your own abilities, qualities and judgement. Self-confidence is important to your mental health and well-being.

Being self-confident can have a knock on effect within your personal and professional life.

So what are the benefits of being more confident, well when you believe in yourself, you will be more willing to try new things. Whether you are applying for a new job, asking for a promotion or pay rise or taking on a new interest, the belief in your self will play a big part in you being able to put yourself out there.

For example, if you feel confident about a presentation you are about to deliver, you will focus on this and getting it over to your audience. If however, you lack in confidence about your ability to communicate, then you might worry that no one wants to listen to what you have to say, or you will believe that you are going to mess it up. Consequently you might struggle to concentrate and you might stumble with your words, which will only stand to confirm your core belief that you are rubbish at giving presentations.

Fortunately there are things that you can do to help boost that self-confidence. Whether you lack confidence in one specific area or you struggle to feel confident with a number of aspects in your life, hopefully these strategies can help you.

Make your healing your responsibility. Yes others may have hurt you, but this is your life, and the more important you make your healing, the farther you'll get and the better life will become. Taking accountability is the opposite of self-abandonment, it is the way to self-care.

(1) Stop Comparing Yourself To Others

Whether you are comparing how you look or how much you earn compared to others, comparisons aren't a healthy thing to do.

So the problem with this is people who compare themselves to others, will quite offten become envious, and the more envy a person has ultimately the worse they then feel about themselves.

Pay attention to times when you are doing this such as wealth, possessions, skills, achievements E.C.T. Thinking that others are far better or have more than you will do nothing but erode any confidence that you might have in yourself.

(2) Take Care Of Yourself And Your Body

It's hard to feel good about yourself sometimes. Not sleeping well, eating an unhealthful diet and sometimes not eating at all, refraining from exercise, all these things will take their toll on your well-being. This has a knock on effect in how you see yourself and can damage your confidence/self-esteem.

Looking after yourself taking regular exercise (when you can), eating well and getting a good nights sleep are all ways to improve your self-image, and with a better self-image your confidence will grow within it.

Start making self care a priority because when you are feeling good about yourself, you'll naturally feel more confident and your self-esteem will rise with it.

(3) Practice Self- Compassion (Be Kind To Yourself)

Self-compassion involves treating You with kindness, if you make a mistake, or have a set back, so what, speaking to yourself harshly, wont motivate you to do better, in fact it will tend to have quite the opposite effect, try telling yourself that you have done your best you could do, and this will help you to move forward from it.

Thinking "everyone messes up sometimes" as opposed to "I'm so stupid" "I have ruined everything" can help you feel good about a situation even if you don't think that you performed as well as you would have hoped.

Rather than beating yourself up or running yourself down, try speaking to yourself as if you were talking to a close friend. Give yourself some leigh way, laugh at yourself, and remind yourself that nobody is perfect.

(4) Embrace Self-Doubt

Sometime we put off doing things, Like asking someone for a date, or applying for a job, until we feel more confident to do so, the truth is that time will never come, so the best way to gain confidence is to just do it.

Practice facing some of your fears, that might stem from issues that you know you might have a lack of confidence in. If you are afraid that you might embarrass yourself or you think that you are going to mess up, try it anyway, the achievement you gain from this will help to build you up.

That doesn't mean that you shouldn't prepare or practice of course, for example if you have a big speech or presentation coming up try practicing in front of the mirror at first and then to your friends or family , and getting their views and the more times you do the easier it will become, so when the big day comes you are more prepared.

But don't wait until you feel 100% confident because this might never happen , embracing a little self-doubt might actually help you perform better, so don't avoid your fears they could give you the edge you need.

(5) Perform Behavioural Experiments

When you tell yourself that you have no business speaking up at a meeting, or you are too out of shape you go to the gym, remind yourself that your (Negative) thoughts aren't correct, and sometimes the best way to deal with them is to challenge them.

Try doing things that you brain is telling you you can't. Tell yourself it's just an experiment to see what happens. You never know you might learn that being a little bit anxious or making a few mistakes isn't as bad as you first thought, and each time you move forward you can gain that little bit more confidence in yourself and your ability.

Everyone at some point in their lives will struggle with their confidence/self-esteem. But if your self-confidence/ self-esteem starts to interfere with your work, your social life or you education, then don't hesitate to seek the help of a professional like myself.

Sometimes these issues can stem from a bigger issue such as a traumatic event in your past, and then seeking help at this point can help you come to terms with it and move forward from it.

Is it possible to have too much confidence (the simple answer is YES) and if you are overly confident you might become complacent, you might not take the action you need to. Being overconfident about your abilities might stop you from studying , or might make you assume that you don't need to practice (and we all know what assumption is the mother of) this might cause you to be underprepared.

So it is always important to have a healthy dose of self-confidence this helps you perform at your best, but you will always have to work on this and the more you do the things that will take you out of your comfort zone the more you will see your confidence grow and your self-esteem with rise with it.

Thank you for reading.