Self-confidence is a tricky thing, and it changes as time goes by. Contrary to popular belief, it is not a personality feature but rather a learned one. Which is why for those with confidence-issues, they can reverse the effects of low self-confidence and have more confidence instead.
Here are the keys to improving self-confidence:
1. Identify and Challenge Your Negative Beliefs
Acknowledgement is the first step to changing your negative beliefs. The way to do this is to understand the process of your thoughts. For instance, you can have negative thoughts like ‘I’m not clever enough to do that’ or ‘I have no friends’. Rather than follow through with your negative thoughts, try to look for evidence that contradicts those statements. Then grab a piece of paper to write down both statement and evidence. This will serve as something to remember when the negative thoughts are reappearing once more.
2. Physical Health Matters as much as Mental Health
Although self-confidence is related to mental health, physical health affects is just as much. The reason is because feeling good about ourselves will be a given if we are fit and healthy. Other than that, people with people with low self-esteem often don’t look after themselves because they feel that the don’t ‘deserve’ to be looked after.
Those with unhealthy lifestyles can make small changes one step at a time by exercising, eating well and getting enough sleep. Even something as simple as giving yourself some time to relax and doing something you want can make a huge difference to your overall outlook.
3. Give Yourself a Break
As been said, confidence is a work in progress. It needs to be worked on. However, it doesn’t mean that you have to be perfect every hour of every day. Even after the hard work, there will be times when you don’t feel good about yourself. Instead of being harsh, be kind to yourself and not too critical. Find ways to boost your self-esteem during a particularly bad day such as giving yourself a treat whenever you succeed in doing something hard.
4. Identify the Good in You
Not only treating yourself one of the things that you should do, but it’s also important to identify the positive aspects about yourself. Having a good internal dialogue will help you vastly in improving your self-esteem.
Depending on the situation, there will be times when you feel down. Without even realizing it, you may say negative things to yourself like ‘I’m not good enough’, ‘I’m a failure’, ‘I can’t do this’ and so on. Combat these negative thoughts by writing down positive things about yourself or nice things that people have said about you. When negative thoughts start to hit you, you can look back and be reminded that there is plenty of good about you.
5. Have Positive Relationships Rather Than Negative Ones
Relationships can also affect the level of your self-esteem. As time goes by, there are certain relationships that may make you feel better than other relationships. Avoid people that will make you feel bad about yourself and build relationships with people who make you feel good about yourself. Avoid the relationships that drag you down.
Have you practiced any of the tips above? Share your experience in the comments section below!
