Definition, Affirmations, and Tips for Gaining Confidence

Are you seeking some self-confidence? Self-confidence can help us more easily reach our goals, stay motivated, and even boost our well-being.

In this article, we’ll define self-confidence, help you understand your current level of self-confidence, clarify the difference between self-confidence and self-esteem, and help you build your self-confidence. Plus, you’ll discover some upsides of low self-confidence and a few self-confidence quotes.

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Self-confidence is kind of a murky thing to define. In many ways, self-confidence overlaps with self-esteem, which can be defined as your evaluation of yourself—specifically, how much you like, approve of, or value yourself (Mruk, 1995). Others have defined self-confidence as a person’s sense of his or her own competence and perceived capability to deal effectively with various situations—for example, performance, appearance, romantic relationships, and social interactions (Cheng & Furnham, 2002). Broadly speaking, self-confidence can be thought of as the way in which we think about our abilities.​

It is thought that a self-confident person can rise to new challenges, take advantage of new opportunities, and deal with challenges or difficulties. They know they can handle life. They may also be more self-motivated, likely to pursue goals, and successful at manifesting—and why not? They believe they have what it takes to succeed. That’s why confidence is such a valuable characteristic and one most of us likely want to build.

What is the opposite of self-confidence?
If we are lacking in self-confidence, we may feel insecure, self-doubting, unsure, and self-conscious. Rather than approaching new situations, it may be our instinct to withdraw for fear of failure, ridicule, or incompetence. So we may also be shy, nervous, and apprehensive. On a more positive note, if we are lacking confidence we are also unlikely to be arrogant, egotistical, or assuming. So low confidence—just like high confidence—is associated with many positive qualities.

​Although self-confidence can overlap with self-esteem, it doesn’t always. You probably know someone who has a long list of abilities and achievements but still feels badly about themselves. That’s because self-confidence—or having positive thoughts about our abilities—may be easier to build than self-esteem, which is how we fundamentally view ourselves.

I suppose that’s good news for those of us wanting to boost confidence—we can do it. But it’s important to keep an eye on the reasons why we want to achieve our goals. If we’re winning prizes, friends, and amassing other successes to try to convince ourselves that we are indeed ‘good enough‘, we’re still not likely to feel very good.

So even though the technical definition of confidence may be more about our abilities than our self-views, my hunch is that you arrived at this article because you want to feel better about yourself—not just your abilities but your whole self. So for the remainder of this article, I’m going to blur the lines a bit between self-esteem and self-confidence.

Before we go on to talk about how to build confidence, I wanted to take just a moment to recognize the upsides of low confidence. Sure, having confidence can make life easier—at the very least we are more motivated to act (Bénabou & Tirole, 2002), so we’re more likely to do things and try things that improve our lives. But imagine for a moment that you have low confidence—you don’t believe in yourself, worry that you might not be successful, and maybe even don’t think you’re good enough to do something—yet you act anyway. That shows an amazing amount of courage! 

We’ve likely all done things in our lives where we weren’t confident in our abilities. I mean, most of us learned to ride a bike and after falling over a few times we probably had very little confidence that we would ever learn. But somehow we did. And after taking a life’s worth of actions without the self-confidence to do so, we’ve likely demonstrated a whole lot of courage. So no matter what your level of confidence, try to remember that you’re still building important life skills. You’re either building confidence or courage, and both of those are good.

Not sure how much confidence you have. Start by asking indicating how much you agree or disagree with these questions (IPIP scale Alpha = .74; ipip.ori.org.)

I am sure of my ground.
Strongly disagree            Strongly agree
1     2     3     4     5     6     7     8     9     10 
​
I think highly of myself.
Strongly disagree            Strongly agree
1     2     3     4     5     6     7     8     9     10 

I know immediately what to do.
Strongly disagree            Strongly agree
1     2     3     4     5     6     7     8     9     10 

*I have a low opinion of myself.
Strongly disagree            Strongly agree
1     2     3     4     5     6     7     8     9     10 

*I am easily intimidated.
Strongly disagree            Strongly agree
1     2     3     4     5     6     7     8     9     10 

* I feel threatened easily.
Strongly disagree            Strongly agree
1     2     3     4     5     6     7     8     9     10 

*These items are reverse scored. That means low scores = higher confidence.

There are no right answers to these questions or right level of confidence to be at. But hopefully, these questions helped you get a better sense of your current level of self-confidence.

Self-confidence grows in a kind of spiral pattern. Successful experiences lead to self-confidence, self-confidence leads to more successful experiences, and so on. If we can get ourselves into this positive feedback loop, we can start growing our self-confidence one experience at a time. Here is a little guide to help with this.

An action plan to improve self-confidence

1. Set a small, easy, totally doable goal. What is doable for me may be totally different than what is doable for you. I might decide I’m going to go for a 5-minute run, go on a date with one person, or maybe just make my bed this morning. So pick something you know you’ll do. In fact, do it right now just to make sure.

2. Take a moment to self-reflect on your accomplishment. Affirm yourself. Say something like, “Hey you! You did it. Now I know you can do the next thing you want to do.”

3. Set a slightly harder goal. Don’t attempt to do too much too fast. Just one little thing at a time is perfect. 

4. Rinse and repeat. Keep setting goals that you can reach and reaching them.

Small practices like these are known to improve our self-efficacy—or ​our belief in our own ability to do or achieve what we set our mind to (Schunk & Pajares, 2009).

As I mentioned earlier, I don’t want to focus this article on just abilities and accomplishments. If we do that, we can end up thinking, ‘Ya, sure, I may be good at things, but am I good?” And if the abilities and accomplishments we’re amassing don’t make us feel good about ourselves (or if they make us feel worse about ourselves!) then what’s the point? When we go seeking to build our self-confidence, I think we’re seeking more than feeling like we’re good at things—I think we’re seeking to feel like who we are and what we do has value.

In fact, researchers have proposed that perhaps the most important contributor to confidence is knowing your worth (Owens, 1993). If we feel worthless, disposable, or ‘not good’ in some way, then we might pursue goals designed to disconfirm our beliefs rather than goals that actually make us feel good and heal our mental and emotional wounds.

Acting for others vs acting for ourselves
For example, I can think of many times when I’ve done what a boss, friend, or acquaintance asked simply because their approval made me feel like I was good—like I mattered. But ultimately, not standing up for my needs, setting boundaries, and saying ‘no’ was bad for my self-confidence and self-esteem in the long run. Instead of doing what felt right to me—and proving to myself that I am both good and good at doing things—I simply settled for a pat on the back that didn’t really fix anything about how I felt about myself.

I know I’m not alone in this. We all bend to others’ wishes at times—that’s okay and it’s even good for maintaining healthy relationships. But we need to shift our mindset to one that views our needs and wants as equally important as others’ needs and wants. And our actions need to be guided by this mindset. We need to believe that we are allowed to take the actions we want to take.

We can start by giving ourselves permission to be who we are. From that mindset, we can remind ourselves that any actions we take are simply expressions of our true selves. They are no longer wrong or right, good or bad. They are simply true.

Sometimes using positive affirmations can help us gain self-confidence. There are a variety of different types of affirmations we can try—for example, we can focus on our positive personal traits, skills, or assets. Here are a few self-confidence affirmations to try.

Talk back to your inner critic
​As a start, we may want to formulate affirmations that shift our negative beliefs about ourselves. For example, if we have thoughts like, “I’m not worthy”, we can use affirmations like,  “I have just as much worth as anyone else.” Or if we have thoughts like “I suck at making friends,” we might replace them with something like, “I have the ability to make new friends.” It may not feel natural to say positive affirmations that go against what we currently feel to be true, but by practicing saying and thinking these things, we help create new pathways in our brains that grow stronger over time.
​
​Affirm your positive qualities
My favorite confidence trick is to reaffirm positive qualities. I’ve even found it helps boost my motivation on days when I do this in bed before getting up. All it involves is saying out loud (or in your head) that you possess as many positive qualities as you can think of. For example, I might say, “I am kind. I am smart. I am determined,” and so on. Even if you have some negative opinions of yourself, these affirmations can help you focus on the things about yourself that you do like.

Affirm your skills and abilities
In addition to affirming your positive qualities, you can also affirm your abilities. In this case, you’d focus on saying statements that remind you of your skills. For example, I might say, “I am a good writer. I am hard working. I am a good gardener,” and so on. This can help us not only feel more confident in these skills, but it may also help remind us that we were able to build skills in the past so we can build new skills again in the future.

There are a few more science-based strategies to try that can help you gain self-confidence. Here are a few of the best ones:

Practice self-compassion
Self-compassion is defined as treating oneself with kindness, recognizing our shared humanity, and being mindful and gentle when exploring the negative aspects of ourselves (Neff, 2011). Self-compassion can help us hold a more positive attitude towards ourselves, which can aid self-confidence (Owens, 1993). 

There are a number of ways to practice self-comOptimismpassion and cultivate this skill. For example, in this self-compassion exercise, you can write a self-compassionate letter to yourself. Or you can try this exercise that guides you through taking a self-compassion break.

Cultivate self-focused optimism
Being optimistic involves looking towards the future with hope and positivity. Optimism has been linked to all sorts of positive outcomes including greater well-being (Carver et al., 2010). For gaining confidence, there are some ways we can be more optimistic specifically about ourselves and our abilities. For example, you can do a visualization exercise where you imagine the best possible version of yourself in the future, focusing on the good things you do. You could also imagine yourself reaching your goals successfully. This can help your mind adjust to the idea of your success and help you feel more confident in pursuing your goals.

Use supportive self-talk
In addition to using affirmations—where we state our positive qualities in the first person—we can also develop a sort of internal supportive coach or guardian angel. The messages we might tell ourselves here include things like, “You’re doing a great job. You’re an amazing person. You deserve a life of happiness.” By saying these things to ourselves in the third person—as if from someone else—we may feel supported in ways that help us feel more confident.

Check out these self-confidence quotes to get a bit more inspiration that may help you build more confidence:

• “Confidence comes from hours and days and weeks and years of constant work and dedication.”– Robert Staubach
• “Believe in yourself! Have faith in your abilities! Without a humble but reasonable confidence in your own powers you cannot be successful or happy.” – Norman Vincent Peale
• “Confidence… thrives on honesty, on honor, on the sacredness of obligations, on faithful protection and on unselfish performance. Without them it cannot live.”– Franklin D. Roosevelt
• “Confidence is when you believe in yourself and your abilities, arrogance is when you think you are better than others and act accordingly.”– Stewart Stafford
• “Confidence comes not from always being right but from not fearing to be wrong.” – Peter T. McIntyre

We’ve covered a lot on self-confidence here. But if you’d like to keep learning some more tips for boosting self-confidence, these articles can help you along on that journey.

Want to keep learning how to build self-confidence? Here are some books that dive into the subject even more.

• Bénabou, R., & Tirole, J. (2002). Self-confidence and personal motivation. The quarterly journal of economics, 117(3), 871-915.​
• Carver, C. S., Scheier, M. F., & Segerstrom, S. C. (2010). Optimism. Clinical Psychology Review, 30(7), 879-889.
• Cheng, H., & Furnham, A. (2002). Personality, peer relations, and self-confidence as predictors of happiness and loneliness. Journal of adolescence, 25(3), 327-339.
• Mruk, C. (1995). Self-Esteem: Research, Theory, and Practice. Springer.
• Neff, K. D. (2011). Self‐compassion, self‐esteem, and well‐being. Social and personality psychology compass, 5(1), 1-12.
• ​Owens, T. J. (1993). Accentuate the positive-and the negative: Rethinking the use of self-esteem, self-deprecation, and self-confidence. Social Psychology Quarterly, 288-299.
• Schunk, D. H., & Pajares, F. (2009). Self-efficacy theory. Handbook of motivation at school, 35-53.