You can have a level of self-esteem needed to gain the successes life has to offer. Don’t sit around feeling powerless to change yourself into the confident person you deserve to be.  Instead use easy strategies to boost your self confidence and get on with a better life.

1.  Get Real. Be realistic about setting goals that you can actually achieve in your life. If you continually set goals that are out of reach or not realistic according to your lifestyle, your motivation and self confidence will decrease.  It’s important to know what it feels like to reach your stated goals to have great confidence. Adjust your goals and expectations until you are pushing yourself to higher levels but still to a point that is possible. Once you get into the habit of accomplishing your goals, you can set higher goals because you know you can achieve whatever you set out to do.

2. Get New Friends. Well, you don’t really have to get all new friends but you do need to surround yourself with positive people that support the goals you want to achieve.  These people should have a contagious, positive energy that lifts you up and encourages you. If the people who surround you tend to be negative, bring you down and destroy your confidence, that’s when it’s time to get new friends. You build confidence by hanging around with positive people who make expect you to reach your goals and support you while you work on them.

3. Develop Skills. It takes realistic skills and talents to achieve goals.  If you don’t feel sure about your abilities to reach a goal, your self-confidence will suffer. Like everyone else, you have certain skills that showcase certain talents.  It might take a while to figure out exactly what these are if you haven’t been using them. Keep working at these talents so you develop the confidence to know that you excel in specific areas then use those areas to start moving towards your goals.

4. Take Your Own Side.  Something you might not think about is the need to stand up for yourself when you have been wrongly accused or not treated well.  When others speak out against you, remember that those words are simply their opinion and that opinion doesn’t have to be accepted.  If you have been wrongly treated, you have the right to speak up about the situation.  Your opinions are important. When you do what you know is right for you, you will feel more confident regardless of how others may feel about the situation.

5. Take Care of Yourself. Be sure to keep physically fit.  Staying healthy and finding a way to exercise can calm your nerves, help manage stress and provide many other benefits to your self –care.  Engage in regular exercise to feel more upbeat which in turn makes you feel better about yourself as well.

6. Reward Yourself. When you’ve reached your goals or met other accomplishments, whether big or small, it’s important to take time to reward yourself. You don’t’ have to wait for others to reward you.  Select something you want to purchase for yourself, give yourself a day off or do something you’ve never done before. Choose whatever it is that you feel is a reward and provide this for yourself to recognize your achievement. When you go out of your way to make yourself happy, you’ll feed your drive to persevere and succeed.  

7. Be Positive.  Use positive affirmations to change how you think about things in your life.  You have control over your mind and practicing positive affirmations can feed your mind with thoughts that led to positive outcomes. Positive affirmations communicate with your subconscious mind which strengthens your confidence one thought at a time. Check out your local bookstore or online for some effective confidence-building affirmations.

Put these techniques into practice and they will soon become habits that lift your spirits to new heights. As you grow in self confidence you’ll start to pursue new goals with more commitment. Although personal changes may not happen overnight, if you apply these strategies consistently, you’ll be able to build up your self-confidence a little more each day. Make it a point to implement at least one confidence-boosting technique every day.