Confidence: The Great Motivator

I think it has so much to do with how we are raised and the experiences we have as children. Parents obviously play a big role but also how we were treated in school or church or by other kids. Also the expectations we learned on TV or in magazines or other forms of media.

The question is how to build confidence for those who struggle with it. My advice is to just take baby steps. Nobody suddenly goes from zero to ten on the confidence scale. But by taking one step at a time, anybody can get there. How? Lift weights. Exercise. Spend time outdoors. Learn to practice positive self-talk. Use affirmations. Meditate. Remove yourself from toxic or abusive environments. And if you need to, fake it til you make it!

I think you're confusing confidence with momentum.

You don't have to be a world-renowned web developer to be confident in your first website venture. Confidence comes from within, from personal achievement and success. You can be confident in anything you're doing, regardless of your experience level.

Where does it come from? I believe it comes from personal achievement. One of the best ways to begin manufacturing self-confidence is through exercise. Pushing yourself past your physical limits is a simple and effective way to quickly boost your self-confidence.

Set personal goals, achieve them and watch your self-confidence grow, in all areas.

Good luck.

How about becoming competent in a topic which leads to the confidence to perform the task. Which then feeds into people giving you social proof that you are competent in certain skill sets B)

Confidence come from high self esteem ,high self image .

Man, I wish I could take a stab at where confidence comes from. So many people have false bravado that it isnt funny. I try and rest on my morals, stay true to them and myself.

I think there is a difference between self-esteem and confidence. Self-esteem is commonly defined as how much you think you're worth. So someone with a high self-esteem will feel that he is important to the people around him and to the world, whereas someone with low self-esteem might constantly think he is worthless (depends on the extremity).

Confidence, however, is sort of different. From my understanding, Confidence is an acknowledgement of how good you are at something. So someone who is confident in talking to people will have no trouble chatting with strangers at a party, but that same person might not be confident when it comes to juggling balls. Confidence appears to be subject-specific, so if you want to become confident at something, you might want to actually take the time and effort to get better at it.

Of course, self-esteem does relate to confidence in some way. If someone has high self-esteem, he/she might be slightly more confident in something that he/she isn't good at, as compared to someone else who has a lower self-esteem. The person with low self-esteem might think that because he/she isn't good enough as whole, he/she might not be good at anything, and this limiting belief will definitely affect his/her confidence levels.

So if someone wants to have confidence in a particular field, a good way to start is to build up self-esteem, and then get better at that particular field. But that's easier said than done. A strong and supportive social support group (family and friends) who encourage and cheer you on will definitely help in terms of building self-esteem and realising one's worth. One could also go through small obstacles to slowly build up one's proficiency; overcoming the obstacles will encourage you to keep going.

Thanks ReferralCandy.. I thinks that's a pretty good explanation of the similarities and differences between the two. It’s also interesting that confidence is also contagious.. is some ways... not all. Watch teams play a game and nothing is going right.. and suddenly they score a goal or something happens that puts the whole team in a new frame of mind… they have a new confidence… a new belief in themselves and their teammates and the whole game changes. It happens at all levels.. all the way up to the pros.

For me, Passion is still the best motivator. If you love doing something and you enjoy doing it, you'll do whatever it takes to be successful.