How Self-Confident Am I? 

Seventeen-year old Jorielle is now a College sophomore but she still avoids going to school at a time when the other students are surely hanging out near the front gate. To avoid encountering lots of people she makes it a point to go to school very early when nobody is in yet except the University janitor or too late when almost everyone has left for their classrooms.

Sally has made it through University and now works as a paralegal for a top law firm. But while she has achieved a certain success and is looking forward to graduating from Law School to become a lawyer herself, she still feels she could not stand up in a courtroom with plenty of people looking at her.

Both Jorielle and Sally are at different phases in their lives but both are stricken with a malady called lack of self confidence. There are thousands of people like Jorielle and Sally who may achieved success in their lives and yet remain unsure of themselves.

Lack of self confidence can be daunting to a child, a University student and even to a career person. It has something to do with poor self esteem that may have been a result of lack of encouragement from their family or just plain lack of exposure.

But while self confidence is truly lacking in people like Jorielle and Sally this malady afflicts most if not all of us at certain times and at certain points in our lives. Each of us is self confidence only to a certain degree. Some have self confidence when they know they are the best in their fields but clam up when they are made to go into another field.

Take the case of a doctor who may be very self confident while doing surgery. However, this same doctor can easily feel shy and clam up when forced to sing on a stage and in front of an audience. Or how about the stage performer who can belt out any song in front of an audience but who could not even open her mouth when being interviewed by a well-known television host?

There are plenty of people who may feel over confident in one aspect but feel shy and helpless in other fields of endeavor. Some people may seem to have too much self confidence when in front of people but it is funny how they can feel less confident when left alone.

What makes a person self confident?

Could it be money, success, talent, friends or any other magic perhaps? How many people would pay just to develop the self confidence being exuded by their peers? Little do they know that self confidence is not obtained from birth; although there are people who seem to have been born with self confidence as their twin sister.

People who have self confidence are aware how self confidence can make everything possible for them. These are people who know their abilities and who know their weaknesses. They take strength from knowing their talents and by knowing what they can and what they cannot do.

Self confidence does not really mean believing that one is capable of doing everything in this world. On the contrary, self confidence is knowing your strengths and weaknesses and then making the best of your strengths while veering away from your weaknesses.

A self confident person can make almost anything possible. He can be on the ladder to success and can expect to make life easier and better for him and his family. Self confident people are the ones who easily recognize opportunities so they are also always the first ones to grab these opportunities.

How can a person build his self confidence?

If you are the shy type then you can get help from these tips:

1. Know your strengths and weaknesses. If you know your strengths then focus all your efforts on this and look for opportunities in this area. If you know your weaknesses then try to develop yourself in that area.

2. Get a hobby. A person who develops a hobby can develop self confidence in no time at all just by knowing that he is good at something.

3. Take note of your achievements. You may think that you are a nobody but make a list of what you have achieved in the past no matter how little and take it from there.

4. Psyche yourself up! It means hypnotizing yourself into believing that you are good and you can do anything if you put your mind into it.

5. Never focus on the negative. Learn from your mistakes but do not focus on that. Instead focus your energies on improving.