Confidence – how to have more!
If you had a big bag of Confidence what would you do with it?
- Go for a promotion?
- Be more influential with key people?
- Lead yourself and others in a meaningful direction, focussed on results?
- Start a new business venture?
Many people think that confidence is situation related. For example, you may be confident in a sales scenario, but lack confidence when presenting to directors. But this is not the case.
Most times when you feel confident it’s because the situation is familiar to you and you have experienced some degree of success. When you lack confidence there is usually some kind of inner reasoning going on that concludes with a feeling of uncertainty. It is this uncertainty that makes you lose confidence – you actually talk yourself into losing confidence!
You can be as confident as you want to be – in any situation using the following techniques:
- Stop eroding your confidence with negative self-talk. Turn your self-talk into positive affirmations about your capability to learn and adapt.
- Add some powerful self-beliefs to boost the way you feel. Some of these beliefs will be about your ability to respond positively to whatever happens. Base these beliefs on your performance in other contexts, i.e. when you have felt really confident.
- Visualise what you want to happen and see the outcome you want in your mind’s eye. Keep your focus on what you want.
- Breathe slowly and deeply whilst relaxing your entire body (especially the jaw and shoulders).
- Get into a state of mind that will be conducive to you succeeding at this task.
Everyone has a certain degree of confidence – but not everyone realises that they can easily boost their confidence levels, in any context using some powerful techniques like those listed above. Confidence isn’t necessarily a strong emotion, it is more a feeling of being relaxed and focussed with no distractions from your self-talk or feelings of insecurity.
Can you train to be confident?
Every now and then we are asked to run confidence building programmes in organisations. In most cases the consultation with the client proceeds as follows:
What do you want to achieve through a confidence building programme?
We are looking for a clear link connecting confidence with business results
And what do you want people to be able to do as a result of their increased confidence?
We are looking for specific examples where increased confidence will bring positive results.
What do you think the barriers are to gaining confidence?
This will be different for every individual, so any programme needs to have the flexibility to work with a range of limitations.
How open does a person need to be in order to make changes at a deep level?
A person needs to be able to discuss openly the situations where they have not been feeling confident.
Which type of programme do you think will encourage more openness – an in-house course or an open programme where people do not know each other and do not work together?
There is only one answer to this final question, and it is the reason why so many more professional people are turning to motivational open programmes for their personal development. The in-company menu of training courses has severe limitations in this area – great for procedural training, not so effective at personal development.
When it comes to removing the barriers to increased confidence and motivation you want to provide a learning environment where people feel safe to get close to feelings of low confidence that they have been avoiding. When an individual is sitting in a class among peers he or she is unlikely to get close enough to their feelings of inadequacy, as to do so would expose their weaknesses to others they are competing with.
The growing trend towards open programmes is being driven by the desire for real personal development, not just stuff that scratches the surface. We have the know-how these days to help people make enormous shifts in their motivation, confidence and thinking strategies, but ideas about the role of corporate training needs to change so that employees, and therefore the business, can reap the benefits.
The Real Personal Effectiveness Programme is a unique experience designed with you in mind. It is helping all kinds of professional people raise their confidence and the bar of their achievement. In a highly confidential setting, and working with small groups of up to 12 you will gain an awareness of the personal barriers in your way, and learn techniques for breaking through these limitations and creating powerful states of mind and self-confidence for any situation. An increasing number of our corporate clients are offering places to their employees and getting a major return on their investment.
Whether you want to lead your team to better performance, influence the board, be a great communicator, pitch to client directors, facilitate change, put your ideas into action, or motivate and energise yourself, the Personal Success Programme has the practical tools and techniques to get you to where you want to be. If you want to know more we have many satisfied clients who are happy to tell you about their experience on the programme, and how it has benefited their employees.
We know how people can really achieve their full potential – read the many client testimonials on our website, or ask people who have attended our courses. You can be certain they will impress you.
David Molden
Quadrant 1 International
