63 Ways to Build Self-Confidence and Self-Esteem

Steve Errey of Lifehack.org wrote this inspiring post I wanted to share with my readers:
Confidence is a tool you can use in your everyday life to do all kinds of cool stuff, not least to stop second-guessing yourself, manage your fears and become able to do more of the things that really matter to you.
But not many people realise that their self-confidence works just like a muscle – it grows in response to the level of performance required of it.  Either you use it or you lose it.  That’s why I’ve given you 63 ways to grow your confidence so that you can become a giant.

Learning is a Good Thing, so sign up for that evening class and enjoy it.

Get out of your own head by asking your partner or best friend what you can do for them today.

Hit the gym.  The physiological effects will leave you feeling great.

Go to a networking event and focus on how you can be helpful to other people rather than being nervous about your own stuff.

Get crystal clear on the things that truly matter to you.  If they’re not in your life, you need to bring them in.

Write a list of the things you’re tolerating and putting up with in your life, then write down how you can remove, minimise or diminish each one.

Look at a great win or success you’ve experienced and give yourself credit for your part in it.  Recognising your achievements is not egotistical, it’s healthy.

Next time you’re at a social event, don’t just stick with the people you know – go and have a conversation with someone you don’t know and you never know what – or who – you’ll discover.

Next time you talk yourself out of doing something (a party invite, a challenging project or whatever else), say ‘What the Hell’ and go do it anyway.

Do one thing each day that makes you smile (on the inside or on the outside).

Look for the patterns of thought that take you to a place where you start second-guessing or over-thinking.  Now imagine that your best friend went through exactly the same thought process and ended up holding themselves back – what would you want to say to them?

Ask out that girl or guy you fancy the pants off (only if you’re single, don’t want to get you into trouble).

You have to keep your mind well fed, so write a list of 20 things that keeps your mind feeling nourished and make sure you’re giving them room in your life.

Stop playing different roles and squeezing yourself into boxes based on what you think people expect you to act like.

Learn to catch yourself every single time you tell yourself that you can’t have, won’t get or aren’t good enough to get what you want.

Take yourself off auto-pilot – make deliberate decisions on what really matters to you.

Next time you come up against a risk or a challenge, listen to what you tell yourself and look for a way that that inner dialog can be improved.  Ask yourself, “What would make this easier?”

Scared of looking silly? You and everyone else.  It’s no biggie so don’t let it stop you.  Say it with me – “It just doesn’t matter.”

Don’t think for a second that you can’t be confident.  There are already loads of things you do with natural self-confidence, you just have to notice them and get familiar with how it feels.  Look for the things you do where the question of whether you’re confident enough never arises.

Listen to your doubts but be ready to make deliberate decisions once you’ve heard them.  Sometimes your doubts are there to let you know what you need to prepare for, so you can use them to your benefit as you move forwards.

Think of a time when it felt like a whole bank of switches in your head flicked to the on position and you were firing on all cylinders.  What were you doing and what’s the reason it felt so great?

You’ve got a whole bunch of out-dated rules that determine what you do, don’t do, should do and shouldn’t do.  These rules limit your thinking and limit your behaviour.  Tear up your rule book and notice how free you are to make great decisions.

Do you get annoyed with yourself because you didn’t make the most of something or stepped back form an opportunity?  Don’t beat yourself up because that’s just going to make you feel worse.  Instead, be brutally honest and ask yourself what you gained from the situation and what you lost out on.  Based on this win/lose balance, what’s a different choice you can make next time?

If you’d already done everything in life you’d have no need to be scared.  Don’t ever think that being scared means you’re not confident, it simply means you’re going somewhere new.

If there’s someone in your life who puts you down or makes you feel small, you owe it to yourself to let them know that you expect something different from now on.  You deserve better.

Flirt.  It’s a harmless way to play around with connecting with people and having fun.

Reveal a little bit of the real you in a relationship that might feel like it’s in a rut.

Acknowledge and welcome all of your experiences – the good stuff as well as the bad stuff.  It’s all equally valid and hiding things away because you don’t like them is just creating conflict.

Always recognise that you’re more than a match for any situation you might find yourself in, no matter how tough the going gets.

Don’t get swept up in the drama of what’s happening right now, look for more useful ways of engaging with what happens in your life.

Don’t automatically give in to the instant pay-off – it often means you’re selling yourself short.

When you feel like stamping your foot and yelling “I deserve better than this!”, take a step back and say “I can BE better than this.”

Confidence sometimes means admitting you’re wrong – always be ready to hold your hands up and change your mind.

Trust your instincts.  They know what they’re talking about.

Fear is a way of letting you know that you’re about to stretch yourself and grow your confidence.  That’s a good thing, so use it to take yourself forwards rather than run away.

Imagine you’re visited by a successful, confident, attractive and vibrant version of you from the future, a version of you who’s everything you hope to be.  What do they want to tell you?

Don’t feel like you have to do everything yourself – sometimes the most confident thing to do is ask for help.

Take a chance on something tomorrow.  Anything, big or small, just take a chance.

You need to be around people who make you feel like YOU, so spend more time with the people who support and encourage you and less with those who undermine you.

Stop struggling against the things you don’t like in your life – create a congruent environment around you that flows and allows you to be you.

No man’s an island, and you need to be a part of the world you around to feel confident.  What can you participate in that’s important to you?

Forget the pro’s and con’s – do something bold in the face of your challenges and fears.

Work on developing the skills you need to win at the things that matter to you.  What can you practice that would radically improve your chances of winning?

The body is a mirror for the mind, so shifting your body into a confident state can have surprising results.

Don’t get disheartened or demotivated when you get to 90% with something you’re working on – push through and you’ll see that the last 10% is where the magic happens.

Keep comparing yourself to others?  Stop it, don’t try to validate yourself through comparison – you’re just peachy as you are.

Put your head above the parapet at work and speak up if there’s something you think could be improved or if you have an idea you think has legs.

If there’s something you’ve been struggling to understand for a while, stop trying to understand it.  Accept it just as it is, fully and wholly.

Shy with new people?  Not a problem, there’s nothing wrong with being shy and it doesn’t mean you’re not confident.  Just don’t overthink it, start beating yourself up or thinking you’re less than because you’re shy – the more you think like that the worse it gets.

Your environment directly impacts your self-perception, so if you’re surrounded by clutter, paperwork and rubbish put a morning aside to clean up your stuff and get organised.

Write yourself a list of the amazing things you’d love to do in your life, and make a start by simply looking into the first one or two things that leap out at you.

Don’t make your happiness or self-worth dependent on being in a relationship or being validated by someone else.  Find your inherent value first, and your relationships and confidence will be immeasurably better.

Your strengths can be used to overcome any of your weaknesses.  We all have weaknesses but they only undermine your confidence if you let them.

The longer you leave that big thing on your to-do list the more it’ll drain you and the bigger it’ll seem – get it done and free yourself up.

What golden threads, themes, patterns and passions have always been in your life?  If those things aren’t present in your life right now, you need to shift your priorities.

Your body image does matter, because if you have a bad relationship with your body you won’t be feeling confident in yourself.  Get trim if you need to, just make sure you get along with your body.

Being confident is an ongoing process.  It isn’t a goal or an end-point that you reach and then stop.  Keep playing to the best of your ability and your confidence will always be there to support you.

Try a new path.  The well-trodden paths of your life can easily turn from familiarity to apathy and disconnection.  A new path wakes you up.

Don’t say “Yes” to taking on a task simply because you don’t want to rock the boat – you can politely decline requests you can’t meet and don’t need to create an excuse for it.

Look at the people you respect who seem confident – don’t copy them, but identify what it is they do differently that conveys confidence and what you can learn from it.

Make a plan to do something, then make deliberate choices to follow through.  Seeing progress gives you important self-reinforcement.

When you feel yourself focusing inwards and becoming paralysed with doubt or fear, switch to focusing outwards at what you can engage and interact with.

Still beating yourself up for failing or screwing up? It might not be a barrel of laughs but it’s not going to help you get through it.  Much better to recognise that everything, whether it turns out or not, is how you practice living a rich life.

Source: Lifehack.org