6 Questions To Help You Regain Your Confidence

Introduction

Once upon a time, perhaps many years ago now, you were confident.

You see, children start out that way – it’s what enables them to reach for a hand or flat surface to pull themselves up to standing when they’re just beginning to walk. It’s how they play and learn and grow.

If you visit any playground, you’ll see this kind of confidence in action in thousands of different ways.

Sadly, though, confidence isn’t a constant thing – we’re never entirely, fully confident.

So, while we might find the courage to ask out that special somebody, we might find this same confidence faltering when we think about asking them to marry us after months of dating.

Or we’re confident enough to do well on the job interview but lack the confidence to ask for a raise – even though we’ve been at the job a while now and know we deserve it.

A lot of times this is because something along the way has shaken our confidence, if not broken it outright.

This guide is about fixing all of that – you’re going to learn how to give confidence a boost when it’s flagging.

And, more importantly, you’ll learn how to build back your confidence when it’s lost by asking yourself Six Key Questions.

We’ll start by learning the essentials, asking what confidence is, and talking about why it’s essential.

From there, we tackle the question of how we can lose our confidence, and we’ll end with an entire section on reclaiming confidence when it’s lost.

Sound good? Then sit back and prepare yourself for a story. The main character is a more confident, happier you.

Ready?

Let’s begin.

The Essentials

Who are you when you’re confident?

Does this question leave you a little flustered?

To some, the idea might seem difficult. They’ll answer immediately, “I’m not confident”, and may have trouble even remembering a time when they were confident.

You might even be bothered by the question, especially if you’re not sure why confidence should matter at all.

If that’s the case for you, perhaps it’s time to take a closer look at confidence itself, because you might not have a clear understanding of just what it is or why it’s important.

What Is Confidence?

When you think of somebody who is confident, what do you see?

You probably see a person with a certain set of traits including several, if not all, of the items in this list:

• They have an absolute, set belief in themselves.
• They consider themselves capable of handling the situation they’re in.
• When they speak, they mean what they say.
• They seem comfortable in their own skin.
• They don’t miss out on fresh opportunities.
• They expect success when they begin a new task.
• They hold themselves in a way that looks natural but full of strength.
• At the same time, they’re not overbearing or cocky in their attitude.
• They take risks.

In all of this, you’ll find one thing linking all these traits – this feeling of confidence comes from inside the individual, not outside.

There is nothing in this world that can make you confident – but you.

Our definition then becomes straightforward: Confidence is a belief you hold inside of yourself. It tells you that you can handle whatever comes your way. In fact, this feeling is so strong it translates into a sureness of yourself even in new or challenging situations.

The critical thing to remember is this kind of feeling has to be a genuine assurance, born of a realistic understanding of what you’re capable of.

Confidence is strongest when it’s built out of self-awareness and experience, and we’ll talk about this more later on.

On the other hand, confidence also involves a delicate balance – if you overestimate yourself, you can become cocky or arrogant.

And if you’re underestimating, then you become hesitant and unsure.

Confused? Let’s put this another way.

Confidence can be talked about as “owning” the situation.

Think about the person who walks into a room and has the attention of everybody there, not because they’re loud or brash but because they look so totally in the moment.

A confident person has a certain charismatic charm arising from inner peace that comes from being content with who they are.

If you’re a confident person, there’s no room for the awkward anxiety we too often exhibit when we feel out of our depth.

The confident person is relaxed and sure of themselves, and everybody around them knows it.

How do they do that?

• They Do What They Love

  This means they dress in clothes they find comfortable, pursue opportunities designed to get them where they want to go, and have a focus designed around their own goals and personal belief system.

  A confident person does a lot more leading than following, and typically isn’t motivated by a lot of “should”.

• They’re In The Moment

  They’re not worrying about something that happened ten minutes ago, ten hours ago, or ten years ago. They also aren’t fretting about the future. They’re here, right now.

• They’re Not Worrying About You

  Your opinions are worthy of respect, and a confident person will take the time to listen to them – but they’re not going to care overly much about whether you agree with them or not.

  They’re comfortable in their beliefs, they’re sure in their speech, and the last thing they’re doing is stressing about whether they fit in or not. They’re just there, doing their thing.

Confident people sound remarkable, don’t they?

But are they selfish? After all, a confident person is just out for themselves, right?

Actually, they have some pretty solid reasons for being confident. Keep reading, and you’ll find out why confidence is so critical.

Why Is Confidence Important?

In truth, confident people enjoy a lot of things in life that people who aren’t confident don’t. For example, they’re generally more relaxed, they experience less stress, and tend to be much happier than everybody else.

Maybe this isn’t selfish so much as it is healthy. In fact, you might even go so far as to say this is the life everybody is meant to have.

Let’s look at a few other positive traits that come from being confident:

• They Are Calm

  If you’re plagued by anxiety or worry regularly, it might be because you’re lacking confidence.

  All these negative emotions are based on one thing: fear.

  Confidence is the ultimate fear-buster.

  Anxious about driving? The confident driver knows they are capable of handling the car under any condition and can manage even the unexpected when it comes up.

  Worried about finances? The confident person knows what’s in their bank account, has a good sense of when and where they’ll be paid next, and has a handle on the bills.

  It’s no wonder the confident person is less stressed!

• They Push Themselves More

  In knowing they’ve accomplished things before (and they have), a confident person tends to look forward to the next challenge and the next opportunity to do something interesting.

  They have a tendency to want to see over the next horizon and explore more – just to find out where the boundaries are.

  The funny thing? The more they push, the less likely they are to find those boundaries. This leads to exponential growth, which in turn leads to more confidence. It’s an astounding cycle.

• They Make Better Decisions

  Confident people are assured of what they know, and as a result, they don’t waste a lot of time questioning themselves when it comes time to make decisions.

  Because they don’t make decisions until they’re sure of their understanding of the situation, they’re also more likely to hold back and think things through before making the decision in the first place. This means their decisions are usually better than those belonging to the average person.

  Think about this a minute. If your choices tend to be right, then you’ll start feeling more confident in your decision-making ability, leading to confidence in your next decision. Again, this cycle of confidence feeds on itself and keeps growing.

• They Set Bigger Goals

  To a confident person, there’s not much satisfaction in doing what’s easy. They tend to set more grandiose goals, just because they’re confident they can accomplish them.

  These great big goals can be in anything from trying to do something big in their careers, all the way to reaching scary goals in their personal lives. The sky really is the limit.

• They Get Stuff Done

  The confident person doesn’t put off tasks because they know they can handle the steps required to complete them.

  They also have a better sense of how long it will take to perform a task, meaning they’re also better at budgeting their time to get things done.

  All of this means stuff gets done when a confident person is on the job.

  This kind of work ethic pays out in other ways as well. The confident person is the one everybody wants to hire on their project because managers know they can count on them to do what is needed.

• They Know How To Get What They Want

  A confident person doesn’t wait around to see if somebody offers them what they need.

  Being confident means they recognize they have value, and as a result, their needs are not only important but completely valid. This gives them the ability to speak up and ask for things, whether it’s a glass of water when thirsty or a raise from the boss when they recognize they’ve advanced within the company to where it’s merited.

  They also aren’t afraid to keep asking when they know the cause is right and will frequently take their confidence and channel it into activism when they see a wrong needing to be righted.

• They’re More Interesting To Everybody Else

  Everybody loves hanging around with a confident person.

  Why? For one thing, they’re more relaxing to be around. Confident people aren’t full of pretense. They are what they are, so you’re not wasting time playing games when you’re trying to talk to them.

  In fact, they tend to draw people in with their natural charisma that comes from being confident.

  Confident people never lack for friends, and in the world of romance, the confident person is the one who gets the dates and is more likely to be in a stable relationship than somebody who isn’t self-assured.

Confident people are incredible. In fact, you’re probably realizing this because you are recognizing more times when you were already confident.

So, what happened?

When Did I Lose It?

Feeling confident?

Chances are, you have some room for improvement in this area – because most of us do!

The funny thing is, we get so used to the way we are, we tend not to notice just how bad things have become until we take a step back and seriously look at ourselves.

It’s like the analogy of the frog in the pot. If you don’t know the story, it goes like this.

Someone wanted to cook a frog (don’t ask me why – just go with it). The frog was already in the pot, but the person had no lid to keep the frog in. Initially, the frog didn’t mind the situation. The water was cool and relaxing, so he stayed where he was. The cook decided the way to keep the frog from hopping out was to heat the water gradually, so the frog got used to the hot temperature in degrees. Over time, he kept heating the water until it became hotter and boiled until – well, you can guess the end.

The point is, we tend to get used to uncomfortable things over time, so much so that they’ve become normal to us.

While you might not be as confident as you once were, your lack of confidence, somewhere along the line, became the new normal.

It’s only in looking back and taking an honest assessment of where you are now that you can see what’s happened.

How Do I Know I Have Lost Confidence?

Sorry - The Rest Of This Article Is Only For Self Help Nirvana Members

JOIN FREE FOR 7 DAYS

Self Help Nirvana is an online community for everybody whose goal is personal improvement and development. Become a Self Help Nirvana member today and get access to everything here at SelfHelpNirvana.com!

Already a member? Sign in.