Turn down the volume of yourinternal critic.

With self-confidence you trust your abilities, feelworthy and accept yourself (including acceptingyour weaknesses, flaws and mistakes). Use thestrategies below to develop healthy habits that boostself-confidence. With confidence, you'll enjoy lifemore and worry less about what others think of you!

BuildingSelf-Confidence

Learn from mistakes and failures.

Don't compare yourself to others.Most people compare themselves to those who are betterthan them in some way. This makes them feel inadequate.Focus on personal bests, on building your strengths, or oncomparing yourself now to an earlier time noticing howyou've improved over time.

Accept complimentsgraciously.Instead of batting away compliments ("Oh,that's nothing"), thank the person forrecognising something good about you oryour behaviour.

Be your own cheer leader.Use encouraging self-talk to motivate yourself tokeep going with difficult tasks, to keep learningnew skills, to push yourself to improve.

Here are some examples of encouraging self-talk:"You have what it takes to achieve your goals"."You can do this""You've coped with difficult things before, you can do it again"

Set goals.Set goals, make sure they're realistic, andtake action to achieve them. You’ll developa perception of yourself as someone whosuccessfully gets things done. 

Life involves trial and error and failure providesopportunities to learn. If you've made a mistake or failedon a task, acknowledge it and learn from it. What workedwell? What can you do differently next time?

E.g., if you're afraid of being laughed at, deliberately give a wrong answer toa question, wear odd socks or a silly hat! Once you discover that beinglaughed at is not as bad as you thought it would be (that you can survive it),you'll feel more confident just being yourself.

Use affirmations.Changing critical self-talk doesn't happenautomatically. You have to work hard to replace itwith supportive messages (also calledaffirmations) like "I am enough",  "I am worthy oflove" or "I love and accept myself".

Remind yourself of past successes.

Face your fears.

Your inner critic (the voice inside your head thatcriticises you) destroys your confidence. Noticewhen your self-talk is critical and replace it withsupportive, encouraging self-talk.

Learn new skills.

Record your successes and achievements ona list and when your confidence is low read itto remind yourself that you can succeed.

Acknowledge how you contributed to the success with effort or skillrather than attributing success to luck or other external factors.

Have you met anyone who never made a mistake? It'shuman to make mistakes; no one's perfect so don't betoo hard on yourself - you're a work in progress!

With practice, you'll  increase your comfort with praise from others.You may even learn to praise yourself!

Imagine you're talking to a friend and use that samenurturing, supportive tone with yourself.

Using 'To Do' lists keeps you on track and helps you to feelsuccessful as you check off completed tasks.

Stable, long-lasting confidence comes frommany sources. Don't just base yours on studygrades or appearance. As you master newskills, you'll grow in confidence.

Fear destroys confidence. You can buildconfidence by gradually exposing yourself to thethings you avoid out of fear. Start small andbuild up to more feared situations. 

Display affirmations on your mirror or cupboards with post-it notesso you repeat them to yourself every day.

If you have to, compare yourself to others who are better andworse on the attribute so you get a realistic picture of where youstand.

Need some help to build your self-confidence? Make an appointment with aCounsellor via the Counselling Portal: https://counselling.monashcollege.edu.au

Practice kindness.Doing things for others stops you from focussingon your perceived flaws. But the real bonus isthat when you're helping others you're actuallyhelping yourself to feel good about you!

Need some help to build your self-confidence? Make an appointment with aCounsellor via the Counselling Portal: https://counselling.monashcollege.edu.au

These tips for confidence-boosting are from BarbaraMarkway's The Self Confidence Workbook: A Guideto Overcoming Self-Doubt and Improving Self-Esteem. You can start your project for increasingyour confidence today by buying a Journal to use forthese exercises.

More tips forBoostingSelf-Confidence

If you're wanting to be more confident in a particularway, try a small step first, see what happens, thentry another step. Write down what small step youwill try tomorrow.

Be like your role model.

Who's your support crew?

List your strengths.Create a list of your skills. When you learn newskills or think of other things you do well, addthem to the list. Think about what other skills youhave that you're not acknowledging.

When self-doubt helps.Record in your Journal times when self-doubtwas useful. E.g., it made you realise you hadn'tdone enough preparation for a big task or youneeded more information to make a decision.

Identify the people in your life whoencourage you, admire you and make youfeel good about yourself. Write about whatthey say and do that help you feel confident.Use these same strategies to support andencourage yourself.

Ask for feedback.

Failure is not all bad.

Identify someone in your life who is self-confident. Record in your journal their qualitiesand behaviours that make them look confident.Try and emulate what they do. It may feelawkward at first, but with practice you will getmore comfortable acting in a confident manner.

Achievements - big and small

Get used to asking for feedback from others.Try it with a friend - tell them you'll find ithelpful to know how to improve in some way.It's not as scary as your think!

Every day, write down 3 things you did well. Theydon't have to be great achievements - recordsmall tasks you completed too. E.g., rememberingto wish a friend Happy Birthday, cooking a meal forsomeone, tidying your bedroom, getting to everyclass on time!

Describe one time that you thought you hadfailed in some way but then it later turned outthat the failure led to another achievement.

Fictional characters as inspirationKeep a record of films and books withcharacters who over-came difficult times tosucceed. Be inspired and motivated by them.Write about times you've succeeded whenthings were difficult.

Step by step towards confidence.

Re-experience confidence.Write in your journal about times when you feltconfident. Include details, like what confidencefelt like in your body, how you were talking toyourself, what helped you feel confident?

Your confidence playlist.Write down the songs that make you feel confident,that help you keep going when things get tough. Addsongs to the list that make you feel like dancing.Remember, you can create a sense of confidence!

Reality check.Self-acceptance requires accepting your strengthsand weaknesses. It builds confidence. Write aboutyour strengths (how they're helpful) and weaknesses(what they teach you) to develop a realistic andaccepting self-perception.

Failing well.Being cautious helps you avoid mistakes but italso stops you trying and learning new things.Don't wait until everything is 100% perfectbefore doing things. Taking small risks will helpyou build your self-confidence