The problem with confidence building techniques

The problem with confidence building techniques

I have a problem with confidence building techniques. Most of them just don’t work.

There are many confidence building techniques out there that will promise to help you to boost or build your confidence, but I don’t think they do.

I think what they offer is the equivalent of a new outfit for you to try on for size.

As with a new outfit, you pick it up and try it on. It feels good. You walk around a bit and check yourself in the mirror. Looking good!

The thing is, at some point you’re going to need to take the outfit off. It’s not yours. Even if it was yours, you’d have to change out of it at some point.

This is just how some of these confidence-building techniques work.

They’re great when you need a boost in that moment, but how great are they when the moment has passed?

What then?

Well, often you sink back to where you were.

If you want to feel good again, you need to go through a confident-boosting routine again. This all sounds very exhausting! And repetitive. I’m not sure about you, but I’d prefer to do the work that meant I became that confident person, not just for a moment but for a while. I’d want to BECOME that person.

Modelling a confident person is deeply flawed

Some techniques invite you to model confident people and be more like them.

Who’s version of “being confident” are you going to pick? Confidence has many guises. The loud extrovert can be just as confident as the quite silent type. To be authentic and to come across with integrity you need to be YOUR version of confident… and the only way to find that is to uncover YOUR confidence, not wear someone else’s version.

Why act confident, if that’s not who you really are? Vulnerability and authenticity are equally as powerful and valid as confidence. Over-confidence can sometimes be a turnoff.

What do you do if you haven’t got time for a quick confident boost? Does that mean that people see the “real’ you? Umm… do you see the problem here?

Shouldn’t people be seeing the “real” you anyway?

Accepting and owning who you are, warts and all, is the best version of confidence.

Alexia Leachman
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