Great Self Confidence

...to live the life you want

Confidence is Crucial

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Well, what happened to January? Suddenly a twelfth of 2009 has been and gone, never to return.  Despite the miserable weather (its just started snowing), credit crunch and post Christmas slump I’ve quite enjoyed January. Its been a time of reflection, planning and generally rebuilding. Rather than embarking on over optimistic goals (or resolutions) it great to stop and think where you are and what is important to you. A calender year doesn’t have to be the boundary for setting goals. Reflecting on this blog and newsletter, Self Esteem Review, and how best to move forward I came across this quote in a book I’m currently reading:-

People who lack confidence and self belief always underachieve. They’re less adventurous and less likely to get the most out of life. They’re more prone to a variety of stress related problems, including anxiety, eating disorders and mental health problems. Low self esteem is the fundamental cause of most family breakups, poor parenting and relationship problems. In addition, much crime is associated with drug abuse, unemployment, poverty and aimlessness, all of which are related to low self esteem.

365 Steps to Self Confidence, David Lawrence Preston Well, that’s quite a powerful endorsement of the importance of building great self confidence and self esteem – and its just from his introduction! [Read more…]

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…]

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…]

Overcome a Fear of Failure

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One of the delights of living in the UK is I have never watched Oprah. So I was surprised when one of my favourite blogs, had “Oprah’s Top 7 Tips for Creating the Life You Want“. The writer, Henrik, is Swedish so who knows how far her influence has spread!

Oprah had an interesting take on failure – she redefined it:-

I do not believe in failure. It is not failure if you enjoyed the process.

Looking at some of my recent posts, a fear of failing can be another interpretation of the problems. With perfectionism for example, a person sets their required standard high – and anything less than 100% achievement of that target is a failure. There are no shades of gray.

If we lack confidence in our ability to do something, our thinking can revolve around whether we will fail or succeed. Failure enters the equation, rather than say “mistake”, when the stakes are higher. Usually with the fear of failing we can imagine unpleasant consequence, rather than just inconvenience. [Read more…]

How to find Happiness

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happinessI have read quite a few posts about happyness recently, as another blogger Alex Shalman has a Happiness project going on. Its taken me a while to answer his questions, which are at the end of this post.

I have read many times that if you’re aim and energies are directed to finding happiness itself, you will never find it. That to try and seek happiness directly is doomed to failure. I would very much subscribe to that view. But whilst recognizing that this is important, it doesn’t take away from the fact that as individuals and society we can do many things that will make us happier.

Some argue that Governments should do more, and focus less on economic growth and more on policies that will help the people they serve find happiness. Some Governments, such as Bhutan, have even started to do that! The fact remains that despite having greater wealth, better standards of living and possessions galore to improve our happiness, in most Western countries happiness levels have declined over the past 50 years. [Read more…]