Confidence Hacks:
99 Small Actions to Massively
Boost Your Confidence
Barrie Davenport
Copyright 2014 by Barrie Davenport.
All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part (beyond the copying permitted by US Copyright Law, Section 107, "fair use" in teaching or research, Section 108, certain library copying, or in published media by reviewers in limited excerpts), without written permission from the author.
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.
This ebook may not be resold or given away.
Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Disclaimer
No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical or electronic, including photocopying or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, or transmitted by email without permission in writing from the publisher.
While all attempts have been made to verify the information provided in this publication, neither the author nor the publisher assumes any responsibility for errors, omissions, or contrary interpretations of the subject matter herein.
This book is for entertainment purposes only. The views expressed are those of the author alone, and should not be taken as expert instruction or commands. The reader is responsible for his or her own actions.
Adherence to all applicable laws and regulations, including international, federal, state, and local governing professional licensing, business practices, advertising, and all other aspects of doing business in the US, Canada, or any other jurisdiction is the sole responsibility of the purchaser or reader.
Neither the author nor the publisher assumes any responsibility or liability whatsoever on the behalf of the purchaser or reader of these materials.
Any perceived slight of any individual or organization is purely unintentional.
Your Free Gift
As a way of saying thanks for your purchase, I hope you'll enjoy "110 Empowering Essentials for a Confident Life" to help you determine where you can make positive changes for improvement and growth. Being a confident person involves all aspects of your life from your relationships to your career. The key is to identify what you want to change in each area and create a plan of action to kickstart a real positive shift.
In "110 Empowering Essentials for a Confident Life," I offer dozens of suggested actions in each life area to inspire you toward action. Becoming a more confident person doesn't happen by itself. You can boost your confidence by recognizing the behavior of confident people, and then putting those into action in your own life.
Download this free report by clicking here.
http://simpleselfconfidence.com/free
Contents
Your Free Gift
Introduction
Who Am I?
Relationships
1. Know your relationship value.
2. Have a relationship vision.
3. Determine your personal boundaries.
4. Notice people pleasing.
5. Focus on the positive.
6. Act "as if."
7. Be aware of clinginess and guilt-tripping.
8. Reframe rejection.
9. Learn relationship communication skills.
10. Build sexual confidence.
Social Life
11. Identify anxieties.
12. Make a social plan.
13. Practice a conversation.
14. Notice the voice in your head.
15. Practice mirroring.
16. Learn active listening.
17. Understand the art of small talk.
18. Notice nervous habits.
19. Practice openness and vulnerability.
20. Gain perspective.
Career
21. Know your career goals.
22. Get clear on expectations.
23. Identify weaknesses or opportunities.
24. Think outside of the box.
25. Prepare thoroughly.
26. Speak out in meetings.
27. Box up past failures.
28. Find a mentor.
29. Dress for the job you want.
30. Highlight your strengths.
Communication
31. Be aware of mumbling.
32. Notice conversation fillers.
33. Pay attention to pitch, tone, and speed.
34. Think before you speak.
35. Stop extraneous movements.
36. Speak authentically.
37. Use humor.
38. Pay attention to nonverbal cues.
39. Practice breathing.
40. Know what you're talking about.
Appearance
41. Pay attention to self-talk.
42. Focus on your best.
43. Improve what you can.
44. Remember hygiene and grooming.
45. Dress well.
46. Use the mirror technique.
47. Maintain healthy weight.
48. Exercise.
49. Get perspective.
50. Avoid media.
Self-Improvement
51. Learn a new skill.
52. Do something creative.
53. Improve your EQ.
54. Search for your passion.
55. Set goals.
56. Break some bad habits.
57. Read personal growth books.
58. Find a coach or counselor
59. Know your values.
60. Define your integrity.
61. Create life balance
Body Language
62. Practice smiling.
63. Pay attention to posture.
64. Use power poses.
65. Use engaged body language.
66. Remember your arms and legs.
67. Have a strong handshake.
68. Dress for confidence.
69. Stop fidgeting.
70. Practice appropriate eye contact.
Thinking
71. Notice negative thought patterns.
72. Practice pattern interrupts.
73. Replace thought loops with action.
74. Challenge limiting beliefs.
75. Learn to meditate.
76. Practice daily gratitude.
77. Develop present moment awareness.
78. Practice affirmations.
79. Visualize success.
80. Focus on compassion.
Fun and Adventure
81. Cut back on your to-do list.
82. Simplify your space.
83. Plan ahead for weekends.
84. Do something playful.
85. Ride a bike.
86. Plan adventure travel
87. Join a group.
88. Break out of daily routines.
89. Find passionate people.
90. Do the "big thing."
Finances
91. Get organized.
92. Create a debt payoff plan.
93. Find leaks.
94. Streamline your expenses.
95. Learn about investing.
96. Meet with a pro.
97. Define financial freedom.
98. Create financial goals.
99. Involve your spouse/family.
Conclusion
Want to Learn More?
Did You Like Confidence Hacks?
Other Books You Might Enjoy from Barrie Davenport
Introduction
"Action is a great restorer and builder of confidence.
Inaction is not only the result, but the cause, of fear."
~ Norman Vincent Peale
Action is the cure for low confidence. Unfortunately, low confidence has a tendency to
immobilize us. When you doubt yourself and your abilities, the last thing you want to do is put yourself out there to fall flat on your face. It's much easier to remain in the safe confines of the status quo and not expose yourself to the possibility of failure or rejection.
There's a reason your confidence has taken a hit. It could be a legitimate reason, like recently getting fired or suffering from acute shyness. Or it could be some relatively minor event from the past that no longer applies to you—but it has grown to monstrous proportions in your mind, and you keep feeding this monster with negative thoughts.
Either way, your immediate or distant past doesn't define you now or your future potential. Change and growth are always possible when you're motivated and determined, regardless of your past, your personality, or your self-perceptions. If you want to be confident, you can be—if you're willing to take action. And not just one action or a few actions, but repeated actions until fear and doubt no longer have a grip on you.
All success begins with thought and culminates in action. It is possible action will result in failure, but inaction always leads to nothing—guaranteed. An essential component of confidence is the ability to be comfortable with the uncertainty of action and the sting of failure. Failure will happen on occasion. Sometimes it happens many times.
Abraham Lincoln had two business ventures fail, lost eight different elections, and had a complete nervous breakdown before becoming president. Thomas Edison, who has 1,093 US patents to his name, was told by a teacher that he was too stupid to learn anything. He performed nearly 10,000 failed experiments before creating the first successful light bulb. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team for a "lack of skill." Even after becoming a pro, he says he missed more than 9,000 shots, lost almost 300 games, and missed the game-winning shots twenty-six times.
More than likely, Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Edison, and Michael Jordan went through periods of low self-confidence. But instead of letting failure completely derail them, they tried again and again and again. They took action and learned from their failures, re-calibrated their efforts, and eventually claimed success. Failure is a temporary state, fraught with potential and opportunity—but only if you get up off the ground, dust yourself off, and start moving again.
The fear of failure and rejection is the only thing standing between you and confidence. The only way to beat that fear is to take action on the very thing you that holds you back. It doesn't take much action in the beginning. Small, manageable actions in the direction of your goals and dreams are enough to get the ball rolling. Every successful small action will give you an immediate boost of confidence to try again. Even setbacks can show you the value of action and reinforce your ability to break through inertia and fear.
I've created this book to help you take small and manageable actions to jumpstart your confidence in ten different areas of your life. You may not lack confidence in all of these areas, but the actions can further cement your existing confidence and provide skills you can utilize for related situations that arise in the future. You never know when you might step into the quicksand of insecurity and doubt and need some tools to help pull you out.
I encourage you to read through the entire book once, making notes about the ideas and actions that apply to you and your difficulties with confidence. Then go back to these specific areas, prioritize them, and begin working through the recommended Action Steps. You may find the actions for one area help boost your confidence in another.
As Abraham Lincoln reminds, "You can have anything you want—if you want it badly enough. You can be anything you want to be, do anything you set out to accomplish if you hold to that desire with singleness of purpose." If confidence is your purpose, offer no more power or energy to thoughts and behaviors of self-doubt and fear. Take action now, and become the person you want to be.
Who Am I?
My name is Barrie Davenport, and I run two top-ranked personal development sites, Live Bold and Bloom and BarrieDavenport.com. I'm a certified personal coach, former public relations professional, author, and creator of several online courses on self-confidence, life passion, and habit creation.
My work as a coach, blogger, and author is focused on offering people practical strategies for living happier, more successful, more confident lives. I utilize time-tested, evidence based, action-oriented principles and methods to create real and measurable results for self-improvement.
As a coach, I've learned through countless sessions with courageous, motivated clients that each individual has the answers within them. Every person has the wisdom and intuition to know what is best for themselves. Sometimes we simply need someone or something to coax it out of us and encourage us to move forward.
That's what I hope this book will do for you—help you to move forward to a confident life where you become the best version of yourself, enjoy the success you want to achieve, and live to your fullest potential. Thank you for choosing my book to support you on your journey.
Relationships
"To grow in our ability to love ourselves we need to receive love as well."
~ John Gray
When asked on their deathbeds what they most regretted during their lives, dying people consistently expressed one of their top regrets was not spending more time with family and friends. Your close relationships are the most important aspect of your life, and relationships are a vital component to good health and general well-being.
Studies show healthy relationships help you cope better with stress, feel healthier and more satisfied with life, and even live longer. Through relationships with other human beings, you grow and evolve -- and you deepen and expand your experience of love and meaning.
When you aren't confident in your ability to create or sustain a healthy relationship, you undermine your confidence in every other area of your life. In fact, having positive interactions with those around you is the cornerstone for success and happiness in nearly all other life pursuits—from your career to your social life.
Your romantic relationship is the laboratory for understanding more about yourself, as well as learning valuable life skills. Whether you're in a long-term relationship or just dating, your relationship confidence is vital to your self-esteem and the way your partner perceives you. If you don't feel confident in your ability to connect, communicate, and interact with others, improving your skills in this area will have a trickle-down effect, improving your health, motivation, productivity, and general happiness.
1. Know your relationship value.
Often when we don't feel confident in a relationship, we assume we don't have many desirable qualities to bring to the relationship. We look to the other person to define our value and reinforce that we're "good enough" to be in the relationship. In dating situations, you might focus on your flaws and feel insecure about them. But you have many positive qualities you can offer another person. If you aren't aware of those qualities, or if you choose not to focus on them, then you're sending a signal to those you want to attract that you don't feel valuable enough to be in the relationship.
Action Steps: Mentally visualize gathering up all of your flaws and putting them in a big box. Then visualize putting a lock on the box so you can't access it. Now that your flaws are out of the way, you can only focus on your good qualities. Write down everything positive about yourself that you can offer in a relationship. Spend some time on this, and even ask a close friend or family member to share what they see as your positive qualities. Place this list where you can see it daily.
2. Have a relationship vision.
Whether you've been in a long relationship or just beginning one, you may not have a vision for what you'd like from the relationship and how you want it to feel. What kind of communication style would you like? How do you want to resolve conflict? How much time do you want to spend together? How important is physical touch and affection? Without defining this vision, you and your partner are simply reacting to circumstances rather than creating
the ideal relationship you want. If you aren't in a relationship now, it's still smart to create your own relationship vision for the future. Then you'll be prepared to find the type of person who will share your vision.
Action Steps:Make a list of relationship questions like those above. You can use this list of questions to help you. Write down your answers to the questions listed, thinking carefully about the mutual happiness and satisfaction of both people in the relationship. If you are currently married or in a serious relationship, do this exercise with your partner. If you are single, write the answers for yourself and hold on to them for the future when you are in a relationship.
3. Determine your personal boundaries.
It's hard to be confident in a relationship when you have no boundaries. Sometimes we avoid boundaries because we aren't confident. We fear the person we care about will leave us or get angry if we stand up for ourselves or have needs. Does this sound familiar to you? Solid boundaries reflect confidence and increase the respect of those around you. They are necessary not only for the health of the relationship, but also for your own self-esteem. Setting and enforcing boundaries, even if it makes others upset or angry, will give you a huge boost of confidence, because you have the self-respect to know what you want and to require others to respect your wishes.
Action Steps:Think about how you've been allowing others to take advantage of you and how you might be accepting situations that are really unacceptable to you. How is this impacting your relationship? Make a list of things your partner (or other people in your life) may no longer do to you, say to you, or do around you. Decide how you need physical and emotional space. Then set a meeting to communicate this calmly, kindly, but firmly.
4. Notice people pleasing.
People pleasing is the desire to make others happy (or prevent their anger) at your own expense. You feel so uncomfortable with conflict or disappointing others that you're willing to do just about anything to avoid it. You're addicted to the approval and good feelings that come from making people happy and comfortable, as you tend to their needs over your own. It makes you feel validated and worthy. Over time you begin to lose confidence in yourself, because you've lost sight of who you are, what you want in the relationship, or how to live your life on your own terms.
Confidence Hacks Page 1
