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How can I become more self confident?

18 Answers
Last Updated: 05/04/2020 at 4:34am
1 Tip to Feel Better
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Top Rated Answers
earthwalker3
May 15th, 2015 9:48am
First of all, great question! :) Second of all, it takes time and a lot of effort. You will have days where you'll feel really down but with perseverance, you will also have many other days where you will finally realise how worthy you are! And that feeling will never equate to the low ones! :) A few tips I have learnt is by trying your best to see the positive in everyone. Compliment random people, including your friends and family of course, that you see (in your head if actually complimenting them is a bit of a large step) and take a simple note of something you like about them e.g the way they walk, their hair, their smile, how amazing those shoes make their calves look. Haha! Try and see the beauty in everyone and eventually you will realise that you also a part of 'everyone'. You are also beautiful! Look in the mirror and say something that you like about yourself each day. One thing a day is fine! They will all build up until you'll practically have nothing you dislike about yourself! However, building self confidence is also about accepting your flaws too. Perfection doesn't exist so when we strive to love ourselves, feel confident in ourselves, being happy rather than changing ourselves, we will learn to be a lot happier with our bodies. Not comparing yourself to others is also a very critical part. When we find someone attractive/good looking, our thoughts can often derail from 'wow! they look great! You go, pal!' to 'That person looks good....I don't have that thing that they have. They're so much better than me, I am not beautiful' or somewhere along those lines. Sound familiar? It's something we're all known for doing and it's a thought process that we must break. Also, I think we just get very used to our appearances, especially our features, so we sometimes take for granted just how special and unique we are. You are your own person and you have a whole lifetime of experiences to build on yourself to master self love. Life is too short to not fall in love with yourself and I have no doubt that you'll feel a lot more confident in time :) Please don't hesitate to message me if you'd like to discuss this further! Take care :)
aparnakher
March 18th, 2015 2:18pm
Falling in love with oneself is the first and the most important thing to be self-confident according to me. We need to accept that we aren't perfect beings but we are just right the way we are. We need to accept our flaws and appreciate our strengths because they are a part of this huge complex system called *us*. Once we do that, self-confidence will be boosted considerably. :)
kindRose56
February 28th, 2017 2:00am
There are so many ways to learn to be confident. For years I was shy and never happy with myself. Recently I have learned that there are things that I just can't control and to just accept them and move on. I also tried new things and met new people. I have mad so many new friends and new activities I enjoy. I am so much more confident about myself and having wonderful people around me helps.
DevilDog1775
January 25th, 2016 1:56pm
You just do it. You can read all the advice tips you want but it all comes down to you. Just do it.
MaestroVictor
May 4th, 2020 4:34am
Think about goals that you want to achieve. Like: gaining weight in muscles, improve your skills in whatever you like to do the most, learn to play an instrument, learning a sport or martial arts... set a timeline for it. For example 3 months. Spend your spare time on them. Improve yourself. Every time you work on it, look at the mirror and compliment yourself. Admire who you are. Smile to people around you. Feel proud of yourself. Keep adding good things to your life. If you can't subtract something bad from yourself, add something good. Those good things will eventually substitute the bad things.
Jimmerr
February 23rd, 2015 11:08pm
Go out more with friends! That way, you will be able to build confidence and build for a future that someday will become your reality.
Anonymous
May 21st, 2019 4:48am
Doesn't it seem unfair that some people seem to be so confident while others are so shy and seem to fumble? I'll let you in on a secret confidence is a skill much like any other and practice does make progress happen. Self confidence comes from a core belief that you are worthy and that you can handle whatever life throws at you. A beautiful thing about confidence is that the more you invest in yourself the more you gain without even being fully aware. The best way to build on it is to narrow down the areas you specifically want to focus on. Whether it's public speaking or being more outgoing, really it all comes down to practice, taking risks and putting yourself out there. Start small. Start with dipping your toe than your whole foot and so on. Don't believe me that it's that easy? Remember back to something that used to terrify you, that you never could imagine yourself doing on your own. Now think about how you conquered it, and how confident you feel with it now. That skill is easily transferred to every other aspect in your life. Practice, risk taking and remembering that you can handle anything that comes your way, win or lose.
FriendlyNeighborhoodPanda
February 26th, 2017 2:40pm
You cannot be more self confident without knowing yourself. Don't try to be someone you're not, and understand that no one is perfect, that we all have flaws, and that that is just one more part of what makes us human. Understand that you are who you are, and that you are unique. :)
avocadoallyson
February 6th, 2017 12:30am
I followed the approach of "fake it 'til you make it" when it came to confidence, but that's a lot easier said than done. Focusing on the qualities you like about yourself will help you bring them out in your daily life. It's much easier to strengthen your strengths than eliminate your weaknesses. Remember to surround yourself with people who love and care about you.
calmingDeer23
August 15th, 2016 11:24pm
We have to love ourselves. We are human beings. And every human has his own problems and issues. So love yourself. Love your brain, your body and so on...
Anonymous
December 29th, 2015 8:07am
Telling yourself that you 'can' achieve things may help. Stay positive and try not to look at the negatives.
Greatlistener87
November 10th, 2015 2:34pm
The best self confidence is in the term itself, yourself. You have to be confident in yourself first and for most before anyone else can. So be positive and trust in yourself in everything you do. It will go a long way.
Anonymous
November 2nd, 2015 3:23am
Try and believe in yourself no matter what anyone else may think. Also try and find something that you're really good at or something that makes you stand out from the rest of everybody else :)
Anonymous
August 3rd, 2015 1:49pm
One thing I did to become more self-confident, is to write down one good thing about myself each night. It can be something like "I liked the way my hair looked today," or "I'm proud of the way I handled this tough situation today."
Jagannathadasa
July 21st, 2015 8:37am
Self-confidence means understanding that you deserve as much love and respect as everyone else. Ideally our family helps us understand this from our very childhood; however, even if we suffer from low self-confidence, it can still be inculcated, although it will take focus and support. My purpose is to give some principles and paradigms of what that effort will look like. If encouragement shines through, and obstacles are made visible, then the answer will be successful and satisfying to my heart. Let's first distinguish what self-confidence is not; It is not confidence. By confidence, I mean an attitude generated by someone who has practiced a skill or studied a field of knowledge in such a way that they can do or explain it without fear of embarrassment, and with ambition to show it off. A truly self-confident person may be put into situations which demand them to try out unfamiliar skills or unknown ideas. He or she will naturally feel some insecurity if required to perform or explain those things. Then again, one may be highly trained in a field of knowledge or cultivate staggering technical ability precisely to make up for lack of self-confidence. In either case, no amount of knowledge or skills will substitute for self-value. Now, one may say, "Well knowledge and skills are important, too!" Indeed they are, yet the attitude of a self-confident person is only minorly affected by possession or lack of them because they know they are "okay", either way. Not so for someone without self-confidence! Their sense of personal value rests on how "good" they think they are at something, or how they believe they're evaluated by others. This locks them into harmful and possibly dangerous emotional dependencies. The two kinds of harm caused by this self-abnegation will be touched on at the end of the answer. Now, having hopefully distinguished actual self-confidence which is inherent and universal, from confidence in particular skills or knowledge, I'll share from my personal experience how to develop the genuine article, not having absorbed it by childhood. Growing up largely alone, I felt a lack of care. This was exacerbated by being teased for becoming overweight by fellow school kids. I learned how to win praise by doing art, poetry, scholarship, music and so on, but no matter how, or in which field I excelled, I felt sad or angry because of competing against an inner voice of shame and blame which echoed from those harsh words of my peers. Unfortunately, I didn't realize it at the time, and by my late teens, I turned to drugs, and well... that didn't help matters. Only after college, when a friend was there for me regardless of my self-hatred, resentment, fear and showing-off, did I finally learn to value someone personally, regardless of their knowledge or skill sets. His self-confidence and his confidence in my self-worth rubbed off. Now I practice it, daily. Some key paradigms: "I deserve as much love as the next person; not more, not less." "Personal worth is an inalienable right of existence, and comes with the responsibility to extend that same respect to others." A final note: Confusing self-confidence with confidence in a particular knowledge domain, or skill set is harmful in the following ways: 1. To yourself, especially if you blame yourself for feeling inadequate. (Neurosis) 2. To others, especially if you blame other people or situations for feeling inadequate. (Character Disorder) These manifest when you a. Can’t master a skill you want, b. Master a skill but it doesn't satisfy you as you hoped it would, or (most painfully) c. When you master a skill, but you lose it. Legitimate self-confidence, is essential to avoid this needless pain or heal it, and gives the interminable life-strength to experience our shared challenges, progressively together.
AnnieWizz
May 27th, 2015 10:15pm
Was once very unconfident and this has been an ongoing journey for me. Whilst everyone is different, I decided to go back too school and also to try to help others wherever I could. Also wherever possible I surround myself with honest and positive people. Most importantly I am recognising that whilst I am not always perfect, I am still worth loving.
tranquilLion61
April 25th, 2015 4:32pm
In order to be self confident you first need to know yourself. Find out which personality you have, your temperament, you're potential and then accept it.
Musetta
April 16th, 2015 12:56pm
My answer would be "fake it until you make it". Even if you don't feel so great, keep your head up and smile every time you look into a mirror. Just pretend to love yourself until you actually do and you won't even notice how much more confident you've become.