Building confidence is a lifelong process.
Although we already covered a variety of tips to help you foster confidence when you don’t have any, we didn’t mention the harder confidence-building activities you can use for self-improvement.
We’re doing that here.
Confidence Building Activities
These activities will help you believe in the power of you. Use them to build confidence, foster self-belief, and improve your life.
Keep in mind, these are broad actions that work for nearly any type of self-improvement, not exercises specific to building confidence.
But they do work – so try them out and watch your confidence grow.
Meditation
Experts tout meditation as a tool for self-belief, self-discovery, health, and wellness for a critical reason: It works.
Add thirty minutes of meditation to your daily routine to feel at peace with your place in the world.
If you want to use meditation as a confidence-building activity, you should try mindful meditation. Your busy mind will throw all sorts of horrible thoughts at you about how you’re not good enough or don’t deserve happiness. Use your session to acknowledge that you have those thoughts and slowly transform them.
Affirmations
Setting daily affirmations will help you shift your mindset toward self-belief. An affirmation is a statement you make to yourself, such as “I am worthy.”
They act as daily cheerleaders for your brain, pushing you to believe the affirmation deep in your soul.
Use positive affirmations such as “I exude confidence in everything I do” or “I’m good at what I do” to build confidence in your abilities.
Setting Intentions
Setting daily intentions helps you prepare yourself for the day. While affirmations are factual statements of what is, intentions are statements of what you intend to do.
A good intention might be, “I will give myself grace.” This intention will remind you to be kind to yourself throughout the day, even if you make mistakes.
It helps build confidence because you’ll stop beating yourself up for every perceived fault. You’ve allowed yourself to make those mistakes, and you’ll do better next time.
Journaling
I can’t promote journaling enough. The practice has so many benefits for your mental health and wellness, and it can even help you cultivate self-belief.
Use your journal to brain-dump all your mixed emotions and complex feelings onto the page, giving you insight into limiting beliefs and helping you overcome them.
You can also use it to record your daily affirmations and intentions, allowing you to review your progress or use it to shift your focus towards positivity.
Learning
Knowledge is power. Knowing your stuff is one of the best ways to become more confident. In fact, some researchers highlight self-efficacy as one of the secret ingredients to believing in yourself!
Take the time to research your goals, study your passions, and absorb knowledge about your career field.
The more you learn, the more your confidence in your ability will shine through.
Self-Care
Self-care doesn’t seem like a confidence-boosting activity but think about it.
How can you feel confident when you’re stressed or exhausted?
Take time to care for yourself. Enjoy a luxurious bath or massage and indulge in your favorite book.
Dedicating time to self-love has the added benefit of reminding you how much you deserve this care and attention.
Believe you deserve it because you do!
Expressing Gratitude
A gratitude practice forces you to think about what you already have. In doing so, you may realize that you already possess inherent talents that are ideal for achieving your dreams. In effect, it builds confidence.
Expressing gratitude for skills and abilities that can help you on your journey is paramount to believing in yourself.
Sharing
“What if they didn’t like them? What if they told me I was no good?”
I understand the terror of sharing something you worked hard on. George McFly understood too.
But humans need validation. It might be scary to share a work of art or idea you’ve put hours of effort into, but try to let go of that fear and put your work into the world.
Show your close friends and family. You may be surprised at their encouragement and be inspired to work even harder!
Building Community
Sharing only works if you have a supportive community invested in your best interests.
Sometimes, family can be toxic. Friends can be jealous, trying to tear you down rather than lift you up. Other times, the people closest to us may not understand our hopes and dreams, so they may be unable to offer the best support.
Because of that, it’s essential to build a community that genuinely cares about you. Join groups dedicated to your passion, discover online communities that share your goals, and find your flock.
People who care are out there; you just need to find them.
And when you do, you’ll be shocked at how much of a difference it makes in your quest for fulfillment and confidence.
Conducting Shadow Work
Sometimes we lack confidence because we’re battling a secret side of ourselves we don’t want anyone (or even ourselves!) to know about.
It’s your shadow self – the part of you that you can’t face, but you must! Shadow work helps you do it.
Shadow work ranks as a top confidence building activity because it helps you accept yourself, warts and all.
In addition, it allows you to fix those flawed parts of yourself, which makes you like yourself even more. Need help getting started? Explore some of our favorite shadow work exercises.
Trying
A lot of people who don’t have confidence lock themselves up in their little corners and refuse to engage in anything.
Trying leads to failure, which leads to taunting, misery, and worse.
But that’s not really true, is it?
Trying stuff leads to growth, discovery, and achievement – even if you fail.
Here’s the secret to using “trying” as a confidence building activity: start small. You don’t need to try something epic.
Try something that’s just for you. Pick up a pencil and draw something just for fun. If you’re bad at it, laugh at how ridiculous it is. Write a short story, just for yourself. Try doing a push-up or a sit-up.
The more you try different things (and fail at them), the more you’ll realize it doesn’t matter. And that will give you the confidence to try even more.
Exercise
Ugh, why does exercise have to show up on every list about self-improvement, even when it’s not about physical health??
I know, I know. I hate working out too. I also hate that it’s beneficial to nearly every aspect of our lives.
But it is.
Exercising as a confidence building activity helps you push your body to your limits, so you know what you’re capable of.
But let’s face it, it also helps us look better, and looking good makes us feel good.
You Can Build Confidence
Building confidence isn’t easy, but it’s doable. Practice some of these confidence building activities and keep track of your progress.
Check in monthly and see how far you’ve come. In a year or so, you’ll forget you ever even struggled with it.