7 Tips on How To Develop the Confidence to Create Your Career
In this article, I write about how you can strengthen your self-confidence and actively shape your (professional) life - your career according to your ideas with inner security and freedom.
How self-confident are you really?
If you can say of yourself: "I have great self-confidence and high self-assurance!" - then I am happy from the bottom of my heart. Really now. Because most people can't say that about themselves. More so, the majority of people wish they were more confident. Do you too?
Let's do a quick self-test: Which of the following statements apply to you?
I feel uncomfortable when I meet people.
I find it difficult to express my opinion.
I always blame myself first.
I find it difficult to accept praise from others.
I am constantly afraid of embarrassing myself.
I have a hard time asserting myself.
Are you looking for valuable tips on how to strengthen your self-confidence and thereby gain self-confidence? Do you want to stand up for yourself more and be able to clearly express your opinion in business without thinking too much about whether it is the right thing to do? You want to be confident and self-assured with people who have a higher position in your job than you do, and you want to shine with your expertise without hiding it? Then check out my 7 tips here. You'll learn why good self-confidence is so important and what you can do to boost your self-confidence.
Clarity
Clearly state your points of view. You want to win over your listeners in a conversation? You will succeed if you are clear that what you have to say is important. Detach yourself from limitations and the belief that your point of view may not be important enough. Instead, express your opinion in an appreciative, respectful and confident way.
How? The next time you go into a meeting/conversation, think about your intention from the beginning. With what intention do you go into the conversation, what do you want to pay attention to and with what feeling do you want to leave the meeting/conversation at the end. That is your intention. If you pay attention to this, you will see with how much clarity and sovereignty you will show yourself in the meeting.
Focus
"Don't compare yourself to others or you will only insult yourself." quote from unknown author. Comparing yourself to others limits you from realizing your potential. The consequence of this is that one withdraws, is less active instead of standing by oneself and one's competence. It is not about comparing oneself, but about recognizing and appreciating one's own value. Because there are always people who are better or worse than you. But what is better and worse? Isn't it much more about standing by yourself and your competence and developing them further?
How? Appreciate yourself every day for who you are and for what you can do. Make it a habit to appreciate yourself. You can do this in front of a mirror, looking deeply into your eyes, going into the feeling and saying to yourself: "I appreciate myself just as I am now and for all that I can do right now."
Relationship
Meet at eye level I remember too well how difficult it used to be for me to meet people at eye level who I considered to be more intelligent, more successful, more eloquent, or who occupied a much higher position than I did. Here, too, you may become aware that you are just as good as you are right now! Let go of thinking that these people are better than you, because here too, what is better? Conversations are not about being better, but about giving and taking. It's about exchange, presence, active listening, picking up the ball and coming to a result together.
How? Become aware that the people you meet in conversation are human beings, detached from position, status or knowledge. They are people just like you and me and that should be the dominant thing in the conversation. People meet people at eye level.
Potential
Be aware of your own strengths and use them for more self-confidence! We all have our individual strengths. These come from our experiential knowledge. Experiential knowledge is the knowledge that we have acquired since the beginning of our lives based on the experiences we have had in it so far. Thus, everyone has individual strengths, because each person has had very different experiences in his or her life. Maybe you are particularly creative because your experiences have taught you to develop creativity. Maybe you are very focused and can quickly filter out the most important information from a lot of information. Self-confident people know their strengths and know how to use them at work and in their private lives.
How? Write down what comes easily to you, what you enjoy doing, what you like to do. Then think about which strengths are hidden behind these and how you can consciously use them for yourself.
Personality
Know yourself, know your own values! You determine the direction of your life by making certain decisions. You decide, consciously and also unconsciously, what is important to you, what is not, how you want to act, how you do not, how you want to face situations, how you do not. Your values and your life principles are like your inner compass. They help you to align yourself.
How? Grab a piece of paper and become aware of your values. Intuitively write down 5 values that are important to you and your life. Which values do you want to act according to and which values should guide you? Then ask yourself how you can fill them with life. How can you act according to these values in your professional and private life?
(UN)Perfect
Allow yourself to learn and make mistakes, and release perfectionism. One of the biggest mistakes you can make is to claim not to make mistakes. It is not possible not to make mistakes. Mistakes are part of the natural process of development. Besides, it has nothing to do with one's own self-worth if mistakes happen to one. The question of what gives one sovereignty is to consider from the outset how one can deal with mistakes. This strengthens self-confidence because then I am no longer focused on the mistake, but much more on being able to act.
How? Learn to distance yourself from mistakes and see the added value of them. Beforehand, you can think about how you want to deal with mistakes, maybe just laugh about it and face it with humor. Afterward, you can think about what you can learn from this mistake. See the learning potential that is hidden in it for you and let go of taking mistakes personally.
Performance
Keep your Book of success as in the society we have grown up in, it is often the case that we see the negative rather than the positive. We pay more attention to what we can't yet do or don't do so well than to what is already good. With this deficit behavior we get out of balance in our self-confidence. Because next to all the things that can still be improved, there are a lot of successes that cry out for appreciation! If we pay due attention to these big and small successes, we strengthen our self-confidence, our self-esteem and our self-confidence.
How? Every month, preferably on the last Friday of the month, write your success table book. I have described exactly how to do this in this blog. 5 reasons to start a career journal/book of success.
Go for it! Create your career
I'm just so glad you've taken this step for yourself in reading the blog article, because you are Amazing! (even if you don't believe you are.....yet). And I would love you to show up as the most powerful version of yourself. The world deserves that! Take action and go for it! Create your future career!
Based on my coaching hours with many women around the globe, I know that's easier said than done. We women often hold back and 'play safe'.
If you want to create your career with confidence, feeling authentic and balanced? Reach out to me, I am offering a new course at the moment and I am looking for participants for the BETA version. In my course “Create It!” I guide you through the steps of professional development/transformation. It is the beta version and starts as 1:1 coaching in February/March 23. Apply here and join me on the journey.
There is only one person that creates your career: YOU! I am here to support you.
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