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Confidence doesn’t last. You have to do it daily.
Confidence is like motivation — it doesn’t last. To remain confident, you have to keep doing things that feed your confidence. Use this checklist to figure out which actions you are already doing and which ones you need to work on.
As you go through the list, you’ll notice patterns. Notably, you’ll notice that confidence is broadly built in 6 ways:
When you:
feel and become more competent;
become selfless;
are aware of and congruent with your thoughts and actions;
raise your motivation and pride;
are in the right environment; and
diversify various aspects of your life.
* Note: The list below is in no particular order.
** Feel free to highlight those you’re good at or want to get better at.
Download the checklist here [MindMeister]
☑️ 1. Learn new skills. Learning new skills teaches your brain that you can grow and become more competent.
☑️ 2. Realize all the skills you already know. It’s motivating to see how far you’ve come along in life and how, even though in your day-to-day life you don’t notice it, you are indeed improving.
☑️ 3. Increase competence. The more frequently you can raise your competence the more that confidence will last.
☑️ 4. Get paid for a skill you’re good at. Getting paid for your skill is a confirmation that you are good at it.
☑️ 5. Do things out of your comfort zone. Frequently doing things you’re comfortable doing might hinder your confidence since confidence is built by achieving things that are hard for you to achieve.
☑️ 6. Do things in public that are considered weird. Confident people are not scared of being different or doing “ridiculous” things in public.
☑️ 7. Record the small wins. Realizing that your days are filled with successes makes you feel good about yourself.
☑️ 8. Set goals you can accomplish. Unfinished, over-ambitious goals are detrimental to your confidence. Set goals you can accomplish.
☑️ 9. “Fail” often. Confident people are not afraid of failure. They realize that it’s how they grow.
☑️ 10. Learn from your mistakes and “failures”. Something is gratifying about knowing what went wrong and how you can do better next time.
☑️ 11. Experiment in fun and safe ways. The more new experiences you live, the more you understand about the world.
☑️ 12. Monitor your progress. The more you realize you what you’re achieving, the more confident you’ll become.
☑️ 13. Eat healthily. Healthier people tend to be more confident. They are less ashamed of their appearance and more willing to go out and do things with others.
☑️ 14. Get in shape. If you workout, you’re more likely to eat healthily, and vice versa.
☑️ 15. Do what makes you happy. Confident people do things that make them happy. It doesn’t mean that it’s all they do, but they prioritize it.
☑️ 16. Know your values. People who know their values tend to be more confident because they are proud of what they stand for.
☑️ 17. Act according to your values. Knowing your values helps, but there’s nothing like acting according to them.
☑️ 18. Practice visualization. Visualization is powerful because it helps you act in a way to make what you visualize true.
☑️ 19. Be affirmative with yourself. Drop the conditional and future tenses, start using “I am” and “I can”. Confident people don’t doubt they are capable of doing things even though they can’t yet do them.
☑️ 20. Drop negative words from your vocabulary. Change your mindset simply by changing your vocabulary to use positive words.
☑️ 21. Become more optimistic. Confident people are optimists, with a good amount of realism. Optimists believe in their ability to do things, and so are more likely to take action that yields results.
☑️ 22. See yourself as an equal to others. True confidence comes from knowing that you’re not special.
☑️ 23. Strike a power pose. It’s possible to tell if someone is confident or not just by looking at their posture.
☑️ 24. Watch your posture. Stop rounding your shoulders, sit or stand straight, spread your arms, etc.
☑️ 25. Wear things that feel like you. Wearing things you feel like wearing makes you confident.
☑️ 26. Connect people you know. The more you connect people you know with other people you know, the more confident you’ll get.
☑️ 27. Accept that you won’t succeed at things right away. Acceptance is powerful. Confident people accept it, learn from it, and move one. They do better next time, so they know it’s not all wasted.
☑️ 28. Don’t give up when it’s hard. Hardly anything contributes more to your confidence than succeeding at something that’s hard for you. The more difficult the things you accomplish, the more confident you’ll get.
☑️ 29. Think things through then follow through. Jumping to action too quickly increases your chances of failure. Not jumping to action fast enough leads to missed opportunities. Both scenarios lower your confidence. Be in the middle, think things through, then follow through.
☑️ 30. Know your why. Acting towards things that are productive for you is a great way to build confidence. It all starts with knowing your why.
☑️ 31. Accomplish something you thought you could never do before. The more difficult things you accomplish, the more confidence you build.
☑️ 32. Talk to someone you weren’t confident enough to talk to in the past. Who did you look up to years ago but didn’t have the courage to reach out to them? Reach out to them now.
☑️ 33. Say no to something you don’t feel like doing. Confident people don’t feel bad about saying no to things they don’t feel like doing. This reaffirms their values and raises confidence even more.
☑️ 34. Stop comparing yourself to others. You are unique. Compare yourself with yourself but get inspired by others. Don’t be jealous, admire. Confidence comes from realizing that you are improving, no matter how the others are improving.
☑️ 35. Be aware of your insecurities and/or limitations. Set goals you can accomplish. If you don’t know what you can currently accomplish, you might try to accomplish things that are too hard for you and fail.
☑️ 36. Help someone. Confident people tend to be more selfless.
☑️ 37. Fight your fears. Confident people are not fearless, but they don’t let their fears prevent them from accomplishing their goals.
☑️ 38. Drop a bad habit. This is one of the most powerful ways to build confidence because it requires a lot of dedication, and is extremely hard to do.
☑️ 39. Start a good habit. Starting a good habit is easier than dropping a bad one, but it’s still very powerful for your confidence, for the same reason.
☑️ 40. Smile. Confident people are happy people. Happy people smile. Now reverse that. Smile and become happy. Be happy and you’ll be confident.
☑️ 41. Read biographies. Knowing that the people we look up to are just human beings like you and me is motivating. If they can do it, so can you!
☑️ 42. Practice gratitude. When you genuinely appreciate what you have and what people give you, you want to give more of yourself. The more you give, the more confidence you get.
☑️ 43. Surround yourself with confident people. “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” — Jim Rohn
☑️ 44. Surround yourself with people who uplift you. Life’s too short to spend time with people who drag you down. These people lower your confidence. As much as you can, spend time with people who encourage you.
☑️ 45. Accept compliments. Confident people take compliments when given to them and thank the person for giving it to them. Not accepting compliments, saying you don’t deserve it, is detrimental to your confidence.
☑️ 46. Do volunteer work. There’s no downside to volunteering and helping people.
☑️ 47. Travel. Travelling forces you to go out of your comfort zone. The more you realize you can do things out of your comfort zone, the more confidence you’ll get.
☑️ 48. Host travelers. Sharing your world and life experiences is greatly empowering. To someone in the same context as you, your story is routine. To someone from a different part of the world, it’s a completely different journey.
☑️ 49. Get a degree. Getting a degree is a proof of achieving something difficult over a few years.
☑️ 50. Get certifications. Similarly to getting a degree, getting certified helps raise confidence by the fact that you are considered good enough at something to do it professionally.
☑️ 51. Get a raise. Confident people can ask for a raise and get it. It takes courage to go to your boss and tell them you’re worth more than they’re giving you. If you get a raise, it proves your worth.
☑️ 52. Walk fast. Confident people know what they want and want it while minimizing the amount of wasted time.
☑️ 53. Never neglect your sleep. When you get quality sleep, you have more energy to perform well during the day.
☑️ 54. Declutter your living space. Every object you have around is one extra thing you have to think about. Sheltering yourself in your cluttered home can be detrimental to your confidence.
☑️ 55. Raise your energy. Confident people have high energy that lets them achieve their goals. The more energy you get, the more you’ll accomplish, and the more confidence you’ll build.
☑️ 56. Delegate to people. Moreover, the more you successfully delegate, the more confident you become since you can accomplish more in less time.
☑️ 57. Accept your quirks. The more comfortable you are with your differences, the more confident you’ll be.
☑️ 58. Schedule your chores and do them. Doing something you don’t want to do is empowering.
☑️ 59. Get support from your peers. Asking for help isn’t a sign of weakness, it’s a sign of awareness. Once you accept that and get support from people, you realize people care for you, and that raises confidence.
☑️ 60. Change your environment. Changing your environment once in a while can uplift you and teach you that you can thrive in the unfamiliar.
☑️ 61. Talk to strangers. Talking to strangers is uncomfortable. You don’t know where to start, and as such, it’s nerve-wracking. Confident people don’t shy away from such situations.
☑️ 62. Be in a serious relationship with someone. With so many people struggling to be in a serious relationship, if you’re in one, you’re the exception. You’ve achieved something many struggle to do.
☑️ 63. Do things for yourself. Never neglect your well-being. You can’t help others if you’re not well yourself. Confident people learn to say “no” when required.
☑️ 64. Have side projects. Doing side projects raises your confidence because it teaches you that you can do things without the direction of others.
☑️ 65. Get a job you want. The journey is the reward. Once you finally get it, it will be because of your hard work.
☑️ 66. Build something “from scratch”. The more you realize you can “invent” things, the more confident you’ll get.
☑️ 67. Work on important but non-urgent tasks. Doing things that are important to you makes you feel more confident because you are achieving things for yourself, not just for someone else’s agenda.
☑️ 68. Have a strong morning routine. A strong morning routine is one that sets you up for a positive and productive day. When you start the day right, you have the confidence you can take on anything that comes your way.
☑️ 69. Have a strong evening routine. A strong evening routine is one that sets you up for a good night of sleep. Feeling energized from good sleep helps you gain confidence through accomplishing more.
☑️ 70. Let your curiosity run wild. Thinking “outside the box” is something you do when you have the confidence to accept that it may not lead anywhere but you still feel it’s worth exploring.
☑️ 71. Listen to music that uplifts you. A lot of people get into a flow state when they listen to music that uplifts them. Your heart is pumping and your mind is racing.
☑️ 72. Practice motivation. Confidence is, in part, the byproduct of high motivation. The more motivated you are, the more you’ll achieve, and therefore the more confidence you’ll build.
☑️ 73. Make friends with someone you admire. Feeling like you’re on the same level as someone you admire is powerful for your confidence.
☑️ 74. Get someone to invest in one of your projects. Your confidence increases when you get someone to invest time or money in your projects. It’s a vote of confidence that your project has value to them.
☑️ 75. Build an email list. It’s a confirmation that your work does matter to them.
☑️ 76. Lead people. The more you lead, the more confidence you get.
☑️ 77. Stop apologizing for everything. Apologize when you’re at fault for doing bad. That’s the only good reason to apologize. Confident people only apologize in the right circumstances.
☑️ 78. Be proactive. Doing things proactively is empowering. It feels like you’re owning your time as opposed to being raced by it.
☑️ 79. Control your anger. Anger is a defense mechanism. Insecure people get angry, confident people keep their cool.
☑️ 80. Make money doing things you love. Many people work for others and don’t have the courage to work on their stuff outside of it, yet it puts you in the achiever mindset, and that leads to increased confidence.
☑️ 81. Do public speaking. You need to have a good level of confidence if you want to do public speeches. The more comfortable you get speaking in front of a crowd, the more confidence you’ll get.
☑️ 82. Publish your work online. Nothing is more empowering than hearing that you changed someone else’s life.
☑️ 83. Develop true influence. The more influence you develop, the more confidence you’ll get because you’ll know you’ve impacted the life of someone else positively.
☑️ 84. Change a person’s life. Here’s a simple strategy to change anyone’s life: add massive value in their personal life or their business. The more people tell you you changed their life, the more confidence you build.
☑️ 85. Teach others. Teaching increases your comprehension of the subject. The more you master something, the more confidence you get.
☑️ 86. Listen to others. True listeners have higher comprehension of their interlocutors and can add more value to them. True listeners are not selfish and listen with empathy.
☑️ 87. Be consistent. Confident people realize that most things in life need to be done consistently over time.
☑️ 88. Be persistent. Persisting through tough times and ultimately succeeding adds a massive boost to your confidence.
Conclusion
Which ones from the list do you currently do?
Which ones from the list are you going to start doing going forward?
What did I miss or what do you not agree with?
If you want to raise your confidence, it all starts by taking the right actions. I wasn’t always confident. This checklist is a self-reflection of things that helped me raise my confidence and I know it can help you too.
Bookmark or print this list and refer to it regularly. Use it as a guide to raising your confidence. Take action, and with consistency and persistence, you’ll get there, I promise!
You can do this!