Today is International Women’s Day and I thought I would post an article as to how people can gain confidence. Which is one of the hardest things one can achieve, especially in this cruel and judgmental world that we live in today. With media photo-shopping any celebrity you might look up to, to bullying taking place in any technological setting; no wonder its harder than ever to achieve confidence, especially for the ever-so-deserved females in our world. Here a few suggestions as to how you can do this, hope you take these into consideration for the better.
1. Stop caring of what others think of you: Unless it’s people looking out for your own good that is, such as close family and friends. This world is already cruel and full of bad people, technology only makes it easier for those people to hide without having to own up to what they say in person. Believe only those who have your best interest in mind, if they know any better they will be steering you into a positive direction. My mother always said to me, “If people are mistreating you and/or saying terrible things to/about you then that means they feel badly about themselves for some reason”. She told me this in middle school, which was no doubt the toughest years transitioning from a pre-teen into a teenager and questioning every social situation and the people to call my friends. To this day, I have always thought about her words and I’m not even phased by others negativity towards me.
2. Learn to value yourself: That’s right, who cares what people think of me? After all, I have all these amazing qualities that make me unique and valuable in this world. This is what you should be thinking of yourself most of the time, if not all of the time. When you learn to appreciate yourself and your self worth, your world turns upside down for the better. Know that you are worthy, why wouldn’t you be? If you can think of reasons why you wouldn’t be then write down all of those reasons on a list, then burn it (obviously be careful). After you do that you should take out another piece of paper and write down all your positive qualities, then hang it on your fridge or your mirror in the bathroom and remind yourself everyday how great you are.
3. Forgive yourself and others: Did you do something that you still regret? Did somebody else ruin your life? Are you just terrible at something and cannot get over it? You’ll never be comfortable with yourself if you cannot forgive yourself and move on from all the errors. The same goes for blaming others, which is always easier than blaming yourself. And that’s fine because perhaps they have ruined your life in someway or another, but why think of it as something that has weakened you along the way instead of problems that you were strong enough to surpass and become the person you are today. The past is the past, don’t bring it into the present and ruin the moment. The faster you can move on from that, the sooner you can be happy with yourself and the present. When you forgive yourself and others, you can begin to spend more time concentrating on and improving yourself.
4. Believe in yourself: Seriously have faith in yourself and believe you can achieve anything and everything. If you don’t believe in yourself then how will anybody else? People can see right through you, they can tell who is confident and who is not. Without believing that you can do it, you setting yourself up for a) a failure, and b) that you go in the ‘can’t do it’ pile of people. Don’t be one of those people, get out there, take risks, stand up for yourself, whatever it is just do it because even if you fail at least you have gained the confidence that you were able to put yourself through something that you never thought you would be able to do and you’ll always come out a better and stronger person on the other side.
5. Fake it ‘til you are it: This is a quote that I heard from a Ted Talk by Amy Cuddy, and it resonated with me so much, I think primarily because I’ve done this myself. I was not born with my confidence, and people are always pointing out this amazing quality that I have. Again, it’s not something I was born with it’s something that I have gained over the years mainly by faking it in the beginning. I always wanted to be confident, primarily because so few women were, and I did not one to be one without this important quality. Therefore, in the beginning and during my toughest times I would just fake my confidence, overtime it worked. Try it, give it a chance, you deserve that much.
Be careful, however, there is a difference between being confident and being pretentious. You don’t want to seem like an arse, instead work on these suggestions and let me know how it works out for you. I truly hope you are able to gain this important quality that seems so essential but lacking in our society. You are an incredible person, why shouldn’t you think of yourself in that way? Good luck to all reading :)
1. Stop caring of what others think of you: Unless it’s people looking out for your own good that is, such as close family and friends. This world is already cruel and full of bad people, technology only makes it easier for those people to hide without having to own up to what they say in person. Believe only those who have your best interest in mind, if they know any better they will be steering you into a positive direction. My mother always said to me, “If people are mistreating you and/or saying terrible things to/about you then that means they feel badly about themselves for some reason”. She told me this in middle school, which was no doubt the toughest years transitioning from a pre-teen into a teenager and questioning every social situation and the people to call my friends. To this day, I have always thought about her words and I’m not even phased by others negativity towards me.
2. Learn to value yourself: That’s right, who cares what people think of me? After all, I have all these amazing qualities that make me unique and valuable in this world. This is what you should be thinking of yourself most of the time, if not all of the time. When you learn to appreciate yourself and your self worth, your world turns upside down for the better. Know that you are worthy, why wouldn’t you be? If you can think of reasons why you wouldn’t be then write down all of those reasons on a list, then burn it (obviously be careful). After you do that you should take out another piece of paper and write down all your positive qualities, then hang it on your fridge or your mirror in the bathroom and remind yourself everyday how great you are.
3. Forgive yourself and others: Did you do something that you still regret? Did somebody else ruin your life? Are you just terrible at something and cannot get over it? You’ll never be comfortable with yourself if you cannot forgive yourself and move on from all the errors. The same goes for blaming others, which is always easier than blaming yourself. And that’s fine because perhaps they have ruined your life in someway or another, but why think of it as something that has weakened you along the way instead of problems that you were strong enough to surpass and become the person you are today. The past is the past, don’t bring it into the present and ruin the moment. The faster you can move on from that, the sooner you can be happy with yourself and the present. When you forgive yourself and others, you can begin to spend more time concentrating on and improving yourself.
4. Believe in yourself: Seriously have faith in yourself and believe you can achieve anything and everything. If you don’t believe in yourself then how will anybody else? People can see right through you, they can tell who is confident and who is not. Without believing that you can do it, you setting yourself up for a) a failure, and b) that you go in the ‘can’t do it’ pile of people. Don’t be one of those people, get out there, take risks, stand up for yourself, whatever it is just do it because even if you fail at least you have gained the confidence that you were able to put yourself through something that you never thought you would be able to do and you’ll always come out a better and stronger person on the other side.
5. Fake it ‘til you are it: This is a quote that I heard from a Ted Talk by Amy Cuddy, and it resonated with me so much, I think primarily because I’ve done this myself. I was not born with my confidence, and people are always pointing out this amazing quality that I have. Again, it’s not something I was born with it’s something that I have gained over the years mainly by faking it in the beginning. I always wanted to be confident, primarily because so few women were, and I did not one to be one without this important quality. Therefore, in the beginning and during my toughest times I would just fake my confidence, overtime it worked. Try it, give it a chance, you deserve that much.
Be careful, however, there is a difference between being confident and being pretentious. You don’t want to seem like an arse, instead work on these suggestions and let me know how it works out for you. I truly hope you are able to gain this important quality that seems so essential but lacking in our society. You are an incredible person, why shouldn’t you think of yourself in that way? Good luck to all reading :)