Great Self Confidence

...to live the life you want

Who are you linked to?

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If I had to chose a secondary theme for this blog it would be happiness. One of my favorite posts is how to find happiness, which started as a response to someone else’s happiness project. In this I cite a project run by the BBC in 2005, Making Slough Happy, where they try to do just that – make the residents of a nondescript British town happy.

There is more information on that post and on the BBC page, but the conclusion they came to was there were ten steps to happiness:-

Plant something and nurture it
Count your blessings – at least five – at the end of each day
Take time to talk – have an hour-long conversation with a loved one each week
Phone a friend whom you have not spoken to for a while and arrange to meet up
Give yourself a treat every day and take the time to really enjoy it
Have a good laugh at least once a day
Get physical – exercise for half an hour three times a week
Smile at and/or say hello to a stranger at least once each day
Cut your TV viewing by half
Spread some kindness – do a good turn for someone every day

One important factor seems to have been overlooked from this research. [Read more…]

Build Self Esteem with Affirmations

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1989 3.2 litre Ferrari 328 GTS Targa at a car ...

An affirmation is a positive self talk statement. They are usually goal based – such as tangible things (to earn $xxxx a year, to drive a Ferrari) – where you can clearly say yes or no whether they have been achieved. But affirmations can also cover personal qualities – such as “I am a great communicator”.

An affirmation should be stated in the present tense – “I am a positive person”, “I earn $200,000 a year”,” I have great self confidence”. The logic behind affirmations is that giving yourself positive messages, the mind starts believing it to be so. This is exactly the same principle as how negative thinking undermines us – being told repeatedly “you’re useless”, we believe it to be true.

I use affirmations. I  believe they are a useful tool in the battle for healthy self esteem. My starting point is that positive affirmations are healing, positive scripts you give to yourself to counter your negative inner voice. They can help you free yourself from the over dependence you have on other people’s opinions, attitudes, or feelings about you and help you feel good about yourself.

Every one of us has some kind of internal dialog, or self talk, going on most of the day. We have two voices, one positive and one negative. The positive one is the one that is supportive of all your ideas, beliefs in what you do and always expects the good in other people. The negative one is the whiner who always tries to put you and the rest of the world down, has no belief in what is possible and makes you feel doubtful and frustrated. [Read more…]

Who are you?

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Not just a great Who song, but a pretty good question to ask yourself. Are you a high flier? Or are you cruising just above the tree tops – or stuck on the runway? Or worse, still trying to find the airport!

Today is December 1st and in a months time we’ll have the annual goal setting bonanza called New Year Resolutions. I have discussed goal setting before in different ways, my favorite being the use of compass setting mentality rather than rigid, over elaborate goals. But also, I have stressed that January 1 isn’t the only day, and certainly not always the best day, to set new goals.

If nothing changes where will you be this time next year?

Much of what we do is habit, from brushing our teeth to the side of the bed we sleep. Changing habits isn’t easy. But if you reflect on how your life is now, how you got to where you are now, you should be able to get a picture of how your life will be any time hence (doesn’t have to be a year) if you continue without change.

Look at all aspects of your life, such as work/career, money, health, family, friendships/love, spiritual/personal growth, leisure/fun/recreation/sport, environment.

To be honest, the best way is to give yourself headings that feel right for you and start writing. Don’t just focus on work or income generation. The whole purpose is to look at your life as a whole and not jump to conclusions. [Read more…]

Does it matter what you look like?

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An obese human male.I recently came across this article – The Best Way to Gain Confidence – where the author (Steve Hill)  briefly describes his attempt and success at gaining self confidence and overcoming low self esteem. He outlined his problem thus:-

I had a speech impediment, commonly referred to as a stutter or stammer. I was desperate, for some unknown reason, to be liked and was basically paranoid about what other people thought of me. I had a bald patch on my head and I am also quite short in height in comparison to the average male. I was also over-weight.

Steve goes into detail about his efforts to lose weight and overcome his stutter. He somewhat breezes over his paranoia and negative thinking…

I had to learn how to become a far more care-free person and to accept that not everyone will like me. I had to become a positive thinker and to ignore the negative voices in my head.

…not exactly explaining how he achieved this!

But what fascinated me was his dealing with his lack of height and his bald patch:-

I unfortunately had to accept my lack of height and also the fact that I would have a bald patch on my head for the rest of my life as there was nothing that I could do to change them.

There was nothing I could do to change them. So Steve [Read more…]

The Secret to Self Confidence is Ancient

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I have a basic principle of not promoting anything I haven't purchased and used myself. This is a review of an ebook I purchased, but then got my money back on!:-

Secrets to Self Confidence

I recently purchased this ebook as the sales page promised much:-

Each day, you will have a short but profound paragraph to read and consider, a simple exercise to complete and a memory verse to memorize. That’s it, follow this plan and with just minutes of effort a day, you will develop a strong magnetic, self-confident personality in no time at all.

However  Secrets to Self Confidence suffers a quite few drawbacks. its quite evident that the book was written some time ago – there is no clue as to whom the author James Stephenson is, but there is a preface dated 1910!  This is the start of Chapter 3 (The Cure of Self-Consciousness) :-

The student should aim here to develop definiteness of idea, sincerity of expression, and concentration of mind. Nothing leads so quickly to hesitation and embarrassment in a speaker as mental uncertainty. To speak confidently, he must not guess, or imagine, or take for granted, he must know. Lack of proper mental equipment is responsible for a large part of the fearfulness of men. One who really knows whereof he speaks, and is absolutely sure of it, is likely to be sure of himself. It manifests itself in his voice, his use of words, his manner, and his entire personality.

On the same page he goes on to quote Newman's "definition of a gentleman"! I don't know who Newman was, but like many other quotes used, it dates the text horribly. [Read more…]