I am part of a community called Introvert Network Asia (Indonesia chapter) and recently was asked to do a talk in one of the get-together.
I think this is quite a heck lot of information to deliver and absorb without any text to go back to, so I decided to publish the outline here.
When the organisers suggested the topic I was like, OK, confidence.
I can see how it’s an interesting and relevant topic to a lot of people especially introverts who tend to overthink and be self conscious about more things than we need to be.
But what should I talk about on confidence?
I started thinking, wondering. What is this thing called confidence? What makes this concept so interesting to a lot of people? So many self help books written on it, right? Why do we want it? How to get more of this? Y’know, get all philosophical like that.
I want you to keep reading so I’m not going to go down that rabbit hole 😉
Let’s focus on 2 questions.
- What is this thing we call “confidence”?
- How to be more confident
With the answers, I hope you’ll be able to walk away with the right mindset on how to think about confidence, have practical takeaways, and can start manufacturing them in the comfort of your own pace and space and practice in all kinds of situations.
What is this thing we call “confidence”?
Let’s start by defining what confidence mean. What is confidence?
I found this definition: “Confidence is a state of mind where your brain believe that you’re capable of doing something“.
Another definition is “a feeling of trust and firm belief in yourself or others“.
Interesting. Never thought about it that way. It can mean to confide in yourself and confide in others. Let’s just focus on confidence in yourself for now.
My favorite quote about confidence is:
Confidence is not ‘They will like me’. Confidence is ‘I’ll be fine if they don’t’.
It means what? Needing no approval. Something internal. Something you grow inside you. Not something anyone give you.
How to be more confident
I think there are 2 sides of confidence:
- Being perceived as a confident person
- Being a confident person
Being perceived as a confident person
- Be oblivious: I like to go out alone. I also enjoy eating alone in restaurants. I was never aware that it’s considered weird? So ya I did it, “confidently”. But reality is, I didn’t know it’s something you need confidence for 😉
- Fake it till you make it. I am sure we all have heard of this advice. pick a role model, model after them, appear confident, people treat you better, you become more and more at ease, feedback loop, and bam you’re getting more confident. in my opinion It’s not authentic, it’s not sustainable, and honestly it just sounds so tiring. Especially for introverts. It would make us hide even more, no?
Being a confident person
Four things:
- Think about it the right way (definition problem)
- Have the right identity (belief problem)
- Expand your comfort zone (capability problem)
- Understand human nature (social interaction problem)
- Think about it the right way
What are common misconceptions on “confidence”?
First misconception: there is such a thing as “a 100% confident person”.
Everyone has things they are confident about and things they are not confident about.
Second misconception: confidence is this destination to arrive at. As if there’s a switch, there’s a secret, that it’s a single thing to be achieved.
“I want to be confident” is a false goal to use in the beginning.
So if you find yourself googling “how to be confident”, stop. And think: what am I not confident about?
2. Have the right identity
These are things you say to yourself. I am a morning person. I cannot cook. I am stingy. Even saying you are an introvert is an identity.
These are things we identify with. All the little things that make you who you are.
All the little things that you choose, either consciously or unconsciously, to form this thing you call “you”.
Now, you might be wondering, what does identity have to do with being confident? I’ll tell you in a moment and it will make more sense.
I actually have never thought too much about “confidence” as a thing on its own, so I never thought man “I am so confident” or “I am not a confident person”.
Now, this is a very common root issue with a lot of our problems that we face in modern life: we have the problem because we think it’s a problem.
If you picked up the belief that you are not a confident person, you adopted that identity, then bam, you are not confident.
The second common issue is we have the wrong definition of the problem.
We think “I am fat” when we mean “I have slightly more fat on my body more than I wish to have”. Another example would be “I am bad at phone calls” when what you mean is “I don’t enjoy having phone calls”.
The first is an identity. The second is self awareness about your current situation / predisposition / preference, detached from your “self”. It is framed in a way that is more actionable.
I am not saying I don’t have insecurities. But I just don’t label it as this umbrella term of “not confident”. It’s very dangerous. Be aware of how you decide to think about something. It matters a lot.
Once you adopt an identity, you would become attached to it. And the way your mind works is it will do everything to confirm your worldview. We might hear the term “confirmation bias”.
If you don’t fix the identity piece before you seek out on accomplishing your goals, you would self sabotage, unconsciously. Or not being able to fully embrace the change. Your mind would cling to that fat person. You will feel you don’t deserve being thin, for example. We are very irrational creature.
I think the very very core fundamental thing to get right, to be more confident is to notice your insecurities and think about or frame them the right way.
3. Expand your comfort zone
The borders of your comfort zone are marked by the stuff you’re scared to do. You’re not sure yet how to do, you’ve never done before.
But the more goals you accomplish and challenges you overcome, the bigger your comfort zone became, the more confident you will be.
This means there is no book you can read, no course you can enroll in, no shortcut you can take, to become more confident.
The only way is to again, identify what are the things you are not confident about. Then work on each of them. Throw yourself into challenges and build your confidence on that specific area.
4. Understand human nature
I love learning about human nature and human behaviour. What makes us tick, why we do the things we do the way we do it, why we don’t do the things we know we better do.
As it has been said a million times before, we are social animals. A large chunk of confidence is measured and deeply rooted in social comparisons.
I’ll just share a couple of hacks that I find has helped in lowering my self consciousness and become more confident in social interactions.
4.1. Appearances (external hack)
Physical appearance matters. You know those viral social experiments videos where someone gets treated differently depending on how they dress? Or the findings that attractive people gets higher salary? Those are true. So groom yourself, take care of your health. If you feel good, you will look good. If you look good, you will feel more confident.
4.2. Mindset hacks (internal hack)
Know and remember these:
- No one has it all figured out. Even experienced actors, musicians, and comedians still gets stage fright. Don’t beat yourself up if you are nervous, it doesn’t mean you are not “confident”. It means you’re human. Set a realistic bar.
- People forget easily / no one cares. Not a single person has you on their mind for very long. This is a superpower once you realize it.
- Generally people want you to succeed, usually it’s not you against the world.
- Ask yourself: “what’s the worst thing that can happen?”
- Don’t flatter yourself, it’s about them, not you. Experience, not performance.
- No one has ever seen the world through your eyes. There is a Universe inside you. Run that shit.
