Monday, May 30, 2011

10 Steps to Building Your Self-Confidence

Building your Self-Confidence is not an overnight process.  It takes a changing of your mindset.  Let’s first examine the difference between your Competence and your Confidence. Competence is your ability to do something.  However, Confidence is your willingness to do something.  Therefore, I’d like to leave you with 10 steps to help you build your willingness to do something.

1.         Know who you are.
This is a key component that I share with most of my coaching clients. Once you know who you are, you can create a market or environment for being who you are.  If you never know who you are then your environment starts to create you which is a recipe for failure. If your environment starts creating who you are, then that means that that gem inside of you has not been developed.  Develop and polish that gem inside and one day others will start to see your true value.   This is a key Confidence-booster.

2.         Identify or recognize your true skill sets.
Find your strengths.  No inventor creates a thing without a purpose.  God has created you also for a purpose.  He has given you all the tools necessary to achieve it.  It’s up to you to discover them.

3.         Developed and enhance those true skill sets through constant learning and exposure.
You must understand that you are always learning. “The man who thinks he knows it all has death for a friend”.

4.         Become an specialist or learn to do one thing very well.  It will serve as the foundation for other things.  Being the “Jack of all trades” spreads you thin and in demand only when other measures are exhausted.  Excelling in a particular area let’s others know who to call when the job needs to get done the first time.

5.         Stay away from asking questions if you aren’t prepared to receive the answers.
In other words, if you really don’t want to know, then don’t ask the question. 

6.         Avoid making statements outside of your knowledge base.
This could put you in an uncomfortable position.  This is a real Confidence-killer especially when you may feel the need add your two cents.

7.         Be quick to listen and slow to speak.
The heart of a person is most often in their mouth.  Your Confidence builds with your ability to hear and respond accordingly.

8.         Be open to new ideas and try them sometimes
Being open to new ideas could broaden your talents and skill sets.  Walt Disney would not be the Powerhouse it is today had it not been open to the new ideas and fresh minds of the people it employs.

9.         Read and learn from the successes and failures of others. It can serve as a roadmap to you on your journey.  It is said that it is “better to learn from the mistakes of others, because you will never live long enough make them all yourself.”  Those are truly words to live by.

10.       Understand mentally the difference between “try” and “train”.
When you try something, you don’t know if you will fail or succeed.  However, when you train for something you have an expectation of succeeding. For example, athletes may “try out” for the Olympic team, not knowing if they will make the cut.  However, once on the team they “train” for the Olympics because the team is sent with an expectation of winning.    Do you always win…not necessarily, but you have the Confidence to know that you are in position to win.

There is a “YOU” inside each of us that the world is waiting to see.  Greatness is knocking. Don’t let fear, intimidation, or your past suppress it.  Are YOU ready to let it out?  
Aim High…
© 2011 Aldean Pearson
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Aldean “Al” Pearson is a Professional Speaker, Trainer, and Perspective Coach.  He is the Co-Founder of the LĪVE! movement, a speaking, training and coaching organization committed to developing extraordinary people, families, and businesses. His “up-front and candid,” yet at times humorous approach empowers his clients and audiences to look past their limitations to find the hidden gems of capability within. He is married with twin boy and girl. 
Contact: AlPearson1@gmail.com

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