the confidence you're craving starts here
a guide to building TRUE self-confidence - how to stop criticizing yourself and playing it small and how to actually like and love yourself
There are two forms of confidence and we need both of them in order to love ourselves and show up as our best selves in our everyday life.
In this letter we will break down the two types of confidence, how to build each type and practical tips to start transforming your life immediately.
Both types of confidence center around your self concept.
Your self concept is what you believe about yourself, how you feel about yourself and who you identify yourself as.
These core beliefs are both conscious and unconscious and are based on your trauma, your childhood, your personality, your values, your actions and your place in society.
Our self concept is crucial because our beliefs about ourselves inform how we act.
And how we act, shapes our life experiences.
If we believe that we are beautiful, funny, smart we will act within that belief and consequently we will show up in the world in that way.
If we believe we are untalented, lack discipline and are ugly, guess how we will show up in the world- as we believe we are.
And whatever you believe about yourself, other people will believe it too. How you value and treat yourself is ultimately how others will value and treat you also.
The first type of confidence is intrinsic.
It is at its core a sense of worthiness and deservedness of all the good life has to offer because we ourselves are good, perfect, worthy and enough as is.
This unconditional form of self love is based on no attributes of our character whatsoever, it is because we exist, we are deserving of love and good things.
In society our worth is derived from how productive we are and so it is very uncomfortable to practice this unconditional self love and worthiness.
But when we develop this baseline of worth and love for ourselves, we can show up in the world knowing that we are enough as we are.There is no inherent need for us to be any particular way but exactly who we are or who we choose to be.
Our love for ourselves is not conditional on what we have done that day, how productive we were, if we achieved our goals, even our actions towards others or everyday situations.
With this unconditional love for ourselves we can recognize that we are human and we can give ourselves grace as we move through the world.
There is no punishment, criticism and judgement, only understanding, grace and unconditional love.
Affirmations for building this type of confidence within ourselves:
I am perfect.
I enough, just as I am.
I love myself in the face of anything.
I love myself unconditionally.
If I never achieve any goals, if I lay in bed all day, never exercise, watch tv or scroll social media all day, I am good no matter what. No matter what I have done and what I am doing.
I ACCEPT NOW THAT I AM A GOOD.
I am a unique personality there will never be another me living who I am and where I am.
I am a unique and divine idea of the universe birthed out of love to turn into a perfectly imperfect human.
I am worthy unconditionally. And I will show up in my life as such.
When we build up our self concept to be inherently worthy and deserving of goodness, we can show up in the world and be confident in who we are in the present moment, not needing to change in order to be content.
Not needing to do in order to receive, not needing to produce in order to be loved.
The second type of confidence is a form of self trust and proof that we are who we say we are and we have done what we said we can do.
This type of confidence is about action, not achievement.
Action breeds achievement but action is the part that we control while achievement is external and so it cannot be a part of healthy self confidence.
You need to build trust in yourself and in your word by doing the things that are important to you and for you.
1. Get to know yourself as well as possible
Nothing is too miniscule. What foods you like and dislike, your style of clothing, what you like about others, absolutely anything that you have an opinion about, explore that.
2. Spend time doing new things and having new experiences.
Any urges that you have on something you may like - a new restaurant, a hobby, a new wake up time - explore them no matter how small.
3. Set goals for yourself and work on achieving them like an experiment.
The benefits of this are twofold: the process of working towards a goal gives you more experience for you to determine who you are, what you like, what you struggle with etc but importantly, pursuit of goals gives you a chance to build consistency and trust in your word and commitments to yourself.
This evidence and proof that you can do what you say you want to do, that you can sacrifice immediate pleasures and delay gratification for your medium to long term wellbeing is how you build trust and it is actually a lot more valuable than the result of achieving the goal itself.
Whatever your goals are, once they are toward a positive outcome, pursue them.
The process of doing so builds your character and shows you who you are and that is even more valuable that you can imagine.
4. Prioritise your needs, your emotional wellbeing and start truly caring for yourself as if you are a loved one.
If you are stressed and overwhelmed - take enough interest to find out why. Listen to yourself by journaling, comfort yourself and set a boundary.
Maybe that means canceling the plans you had later that day so you could recoup.
Be invested in your physical and emotional wellbeing - take care of your needs and show yourself that you are safe because you have your back and you care about how you feel.
Once we continue on this journey, our opinion and appreciation of ourselves will transform.
And as always, you are worth that effort.
Talk to you next Sunday.
With love,
Aura