What Everybody Ought to Know About Self-Confidence
In this article I will continue my analysis of the self-confidence. We’ll talk about some general things that everyone should know. :)
This will be the first article in a new series of articles about self-confidence.
Some General Points
1. When you act, do it for yourself. Not because of the expectations of others.
2. Be imperfect. Perfection is the expectation of excellent, complete and delightful outcome. However, perfectionism can paralyze you. Do not expect to become perfect. Allow yourself to stay imperfect. Love your imperfections. Be you.
3. Shyness is… Shyness is feeling of low Self-Confidence and social anxiety (or “social phobia”) in social situations, especially with new people.
4. Self-confidence is extremely important for personal growth and development.
5. Appreciate your own and other people’s uniqueness.
6. Say “no” to things you do not want!
7. Do what you believe to be right. Do not pay attention to the unfair criticism.
8. Do not be afraid to commit mistakes. You will suffer more if you do not try, then if you try and fail. Even appreciate your mistakes and congratulate yourself on the effort.
9. Do something new. Take risks. No, it will not make you weaker, starting something new and unknown will make you (psychologically) stronger.
10. Keep your mind relaxed and playful. There is no need to stress about anything. Life is not so serious.
11. There is no need to emphasize your victories to others. If someone like what you did, maybe he will tell you, maybe not. It is his opinion and choice, and you have nothing to do with it.
12. Arrogance is not confidence.
13. You do not need love and approval from others as much as you need love and approve from yourself.
14. Do yourself something nice.
15. Set small, baby-goals and achieve them. This will increase your confidence.
16. You are beautiful! Believe me! I do not want to hear anything against your physical appearance ever more! I warn you. I will kick your ass if you do it again!
Questions Before You Start
Before you start building your self-confidence, ask the following questions:
1. Do you want change? Honestly. Are you willing to make a change from a state of insecurity in the state of self-confidence? If not, know that it’s totally OK with me. You have a tremendous potential in yourself. It’s a pity that lack of will to build self-confidence is preventing you to unleash that potential…
2. What do you already know about self-confidence?
3. How much you are willing to focus on building self-confidence? Imagine the following situation. You hired workers to build your house. But there was a problem. Workers do not concentrate on quality of work. What will this house be? Such will be your self-confidence if you don’t devote enough time, attention and energy to it. If you are not serious, do not bother!
4. Do you believe that it is possible to become self-confident person? You do not know me. But please believe me when I say this. I believe that it is quite possible for the great majority of people to build their self-confidence. I managed that, literally starting from scratch.
Self-confidence is like any skill. If you are not skilled in baseball, try every morning to shoot 100 balls, and with time you will definitely become more skilled. Also to learn self-confidence, you must pass through various life situations. So, it’s possible to build self-confidence.
5. Why do you want confidence? At this moment, take a pen and paper or open notepad and list the reasons why you want to have self-confidence. Or build on the ideas of others. Write anything.
Common Mistakes
What are the most common mistakes made in the start and in the process of building self-confidence?
1. Narrowing your perspective. Be open to new ideas, principles and methods. A common mistake of people who people who don’t know nothing about the self-confidence is that they focus on the idea of a single author. Research deep. Observe your surroundings and people. Bring your own conclusions.
2. More reading than action. One action, even unsuccessful, is the same as reading thousands of articles.
3. “It can’t be done.” Try it and you’ll see. After all, do you have something smarter to do?
4. Allowing the past to control your present. For just about every man there is something wrong in the past. It is not a reason to block yourself. Forget the past. Work on the present.
5. Your reaction to a problem. To clarify something. There will be problems and challenges. They will help you grow. You can’t say, “Oh no, I have a problem!” Problems are signs of progress!
6. “What will others think?” Believe me, most of the people who criticize don’t have courage to change their own lives, and that’s why they criticize. You’ve had the courage to act, to build yourself. Be proud and do not pay attention to other people.
7. Ignoring the others. Of course, there are people with positive criticism, ideas and suggestions. Listen to them. As I said, be open to new ideas. You have to divide the people who criticize without sense and people with constructive criticism.
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Marko: Great information filled post. I thought what you said about really being able to improve your self confidence and build it was important. It really is like other things that we work on correcting and getting better at. In many instances, we literally have to reprogram our minds and those thoughts that have somehow seeped into it that are working against us. However, when we do focus on improving our self confidence and chipping away at any limiting beliefs, it is amazing how much we can strengthen our confidence. Thanks for sharing your thoughts and these tips.
Great post! Very informative and straight to the point. I love how you use bulletin for each section to make it easier for us to soak in. It might take me a while to answer these questions before I get started but I think they are all very good questions. Self-confidence to me is to have a well put mind and body working together in a nice flow.. feeling good about yourself. Thanks for the tips!
@Sibyl
Thank you for your great comment Sibyl… Yes, self-confidence is developed we are not not born with… Self-confidence helps us to liberate our potential, and grow.
@Justin
Thanks Justin… Bullets and lists are easier to read than paragraphs, and they are good to the eye.
An interesting view of the self-confidence…
Hey Marko,
Wonderfully written post! You posed the very amazing question, “Do you really want Change?” The answer to this question for each person is what will determine where that “self confidence” really comes from.
Thanks Baker…
Interesting point, I think that everyone, no matter how mentally weak to be, can positively answer this question.
Hi Marko, thanks for this list on what we should know about confidence. What I liked about what you said in the beginning was the concept of being imperfect. I have a perfectionist tick in me for many years, and during times, it made me feel miserable and paralyzed (like you mention in the article). If we can accept to be imperfect, we will be more accepting our ourselves, resulting in more confidence in the actions that we take everyday.
Yes Hulbert, perfectionism is a big problem, it was my problem before. Perfectionism has denied me many great things in life. I was afraid to be imperfect, I was afraid of mistakes. And then, somehow, I relaxed. I quit to I expect of myself to be a “Marko – the Great.” And I became “just Marko”. Some would say that it made me weaker. But my life is better. I do things the best I can, but do not expect them to be perfect.
Hi Marko.
#6 is cool. I always feel great when I say “no” to something I don’t want. If I see a boring article that has no message, I don’t reply to it, or if I don’t want to go to a certain event with friends because I know I won’t enjoy the atmosphere or what occurs, I avoid it and am glad about that. We can pick and choose what we do.
11 is good because I don’t usually get much in return when I announce a victory. I sometimes even get stepped on in some way. Best to keep those not as mentioned.
Hey Armen I’m glad you stopped by, thanks for the comment.
Marco,
I have noticed that some shy people are confident but they are just shy around people for some reason. I am on opposite side, I am typical chatty gemini and I have to work on listening part. Does that mean I am more confident? Hardly no. I still need to work on some things, which is good thing otherwise it will be so boring to be perfect that no changes will required.
I can not wait to see more on this series.
Btw, I like your about page and I thought Marco is real name! It does not matter, even if it is not as people will read what you write and not based on your name. That is just thought.
Wow, an interesting point with shyness, Zengirl, I can not believe I missed that…
Actually, here I use my real name, Marko.
In English speaking countries you will often hear names such as “Mark” or “Marco” than “Marko.” That’s why my name is sometimes strange for people.