Make Yourself Confident As Ever With Seven Simple Steps
Kristyn Meyer is on a journey to make herself the best human that she can be. These posts are a reflection of that. She welcomes your support via reading and through commissioned affiliate links within her posts! To stay up to date on all of her shenanigans, please subscribe to her email list! (psst…there’s a free gift involved)
Can I tell you what I DON’T like about self-help books?
They are long. And they have a lot of words.
And that’s not a bad thing. The authors have a lot to say. I completely get that.
But the amount of times I actually implement something that I have read about in one of those books is….rare.
Because by the time I get done reading it, I have forgotten a lot of the things that I learned about. And I am also a bit overwhelmed by everything that was placed in my brain that I do remember. I still read them, but often have this mentality upon finishing them.
Recently, I was asked to create a course on confidence building, and in the call that I had with the client, we talked about the need for it to be high-level. For just the reason that I stated above.
Too much is overwhelming. And it isn’t efficient.
I wanted to pass along a few of the ideas I sent to my client. Because they helped me, and I know that they are bound to help some of you.
Tell Yourself Why You’re Great
“If we cannot see the possibility of greatness, how can we dream it?” Lee Strasberg
Seriously. This is not a drill. Every single day, write down three things that you love about yourself. You may find this difficult, and that’s okay. You might start out writing really superficial things like: “I love how my left knee protrudes out a bit more than my right.” This is okay because as time goes on, you will learn to love more and more things about yourself.
Side note: WRITE THEM DOWN. Don’t leave them in your head. Writing them down has a bigger impact than just thinking about them.
“The secret of living a life of excellence is merely a matter of thinking thoughts of excellence. Really, it’s a matter of programming our minds with the kind of information that will set us free.” Charles R. Swindoll
Eat For Mental Health
"Let food be thy medicine, thy medicine shall be thy food." Hippocrates
Breakfast is notoriously called the most important meal of the day. And they aren’t lying. It’s not a marketing scheme. There are many reasons that it is important, but it truly sets the stage for the day. Start with water. You wake up slightly dehydrated as it is, and that alone impacts your mental health. Quench your body right off the bat, and then aim for a healthy breakfast. Include plenty of protein and greens. This will set up your brain for success.
"One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well." Virginia Woolf
Speak To Your Strengths
“Play to your strengths." "I haven’t got any," said Harry, before he could stop himself. "Excuse me," growled Moody, "you’ve got strengths if I say you’ve got them. Think now. What are you best at?” J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
So often, as we are going through our day, we get hung up on minute details that didn’t go according to plan. Maybe we hit send too early on an email or didn’t do well in a meeting. We let these things beat us up, and we shouldn’t. Change the dialogue to what went right. What did you do right during the day? Perhaps you completed a big project that you had been working on for a while. Or maybe you were able to fix an issue that a coworker was having. Even if it’s just getting your desk cleaned off, there is always something that you did well during the day. Highlight the strengths, not the weaknesses.
“Self-love is not the process of ignoring your flaws. Self-love is expanding your awareness to include your flaws and your strengths.”
Vironika Tugaleva
Get Some Sleep
I recently spoke on a video about Care/Of vitamins and how they have helped me so much. For years I have had high-energy and low-energy days. I just associated them with my anxiety/depression/OCD and my thyroid disorder. Now that I am working for myself and my mental health is in a better place, I took a deeper look at it. My diet is definitely not top-notch, and I knew that I was lacking in some nutrients. So I started a Care/Of vitamin regime just to see if it would help. And the answer was yes. Yes, it helped. But the thing it helped most, besides the differing energy days, was my sleep. They added magnesium to my vitamin pack, and I have been sleeping like a rock.
Because of my higher-quality sleep, my mental health is even better than it was, and my confidence has skyrocketed even more.
“The minute anyone’s getting anxious I say, ‘You must eat and you must sleep.’ They’re the two vital elements for a healthy life.” Francesca Annis
Confront A Fear
“One of the greatest discoveries a man makes, one of his great surprises, is to find he can do what he was afraid he couldn’t do.” Henry Ford
The best way to boost your confidence quickly is to face fear. And it doesn’t have to be a big fear. Or even fully confronting it. In the end, the confidence will come as a result of feeling accomplished in what you achieved. Let’s say that you have a fear of speaking in public, but you have a meeting coming up with an opportunity to speak in front of a group.
Take baby steps to prepare. On one day, write down the key points you want to address. The next day, write a script. On the third day, read through it several times. When day four comes, practice in front of a mirror until you feel comfortable. The day before the meeting, read it in front of your family. When the meeting comes, you will feel prepared and ready, and your confidence will already be higher. And when you walk out of that meeting, your confidence will be soaring.
“Being brave isn’t the absence of fear. Being brave is having that fear but finding a way through it.” Bear Grylls
Laugh
“A good laugh and a long sleep are the best cures in the doctor’s book.” Irish proverb
When they say that laughter is the best medicine, they aren’t wrong. The simple act of laughing can spark endorphins that trigger our happiness. With our happiness escalating, our confidence level rises. It’s truly a win-win-win situation. You don’t even have to laugh about something funny. You can just laugh to laugh. However, if you need something to get you started, turn on a funny movie or some comedy, or just go to Pandora and type in comedy.
Help Others
Many of us have donated our time to volunteering in one way or another throughout our lives. Think back on those events. How did they leave you feeling emotionally? I personally think back to the times my family and I would volunteer at soup kitchens or homeless shelters and specifically remember the feeling of lightness that I had when I left. The experience would leave me forgetting whatever worries I had in my head when I arrived. The gratitude that those I was serving expressed helped me to put my own life in perspective. I had a smile plastered on my face from the conversations and laughter exchanged during my time. Although I was there to help others, they were also helping me.
In summary…
These are just seven quick things that you can do to help you get to a better level of confidence than where you are. These take very little time to implement but can have a big impact in the long term.
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