#451 The Blue Print To Confidence and Self Assurity

The REAL Path to Self-Confidence: Why There's No "Blueprint" But Steps to Self-Assurity That Actually Work What This Episode Is Really About Let's get one thing straight right off the bat - there's no such thing as a confidence blueprint. If someone's selling you that, it's clickbait, pure and simple. But here's what I can give you: a real, honest look at self-assurity and how to build it from the ground up. You see, I've been where you are. I remember being at the peak of my confidence in my career - I couldn't do anything wrong, just knew I had it all figured out. Until I didn't. Something unexpected happened, boom, that confidence bloody went. Completely went. So where did it go? Well, stick around because I'll tell you about that. Self-Assurity vs The Confidence Myth Here's the thing about self-assurity - it's different from confidence. Self-assurance is being confident in the things you say and do because you're sure of your abilities. I love this little saying: being confident in your competence. Your competence is your abilities, isn't it? And when you're confident in your competence, you're self-assured. But it doesn't have to be in everything. If you haven't got the abilities, you can't be confident in them. That's where mastery comes in - doing what you know and knowing what you do. That's being confident in the things you say and do because you're sure of your abilities. There are people who know it but don't do it. And there are others who do what they don't know and think they're confident - but that's just overconfidence getting into the realms of stupidity. Becoming More Self-Assured You already have self-assurance - you just want a bit more. And that's all about knowing what you want. You need a target to aim for. If you know what you know, then you probably know what you don't know. Then you can decide what you want to know. What could you aim for? Maybe you want to be more social, deal with that social anxiety that's holding you back. Maybe you want to speak out more at meetings, express yourself in a group, maybe even do a podcast. Perhaps you want a better job, a promotion, more friends, a partner, or just to learn a particular skill. You name it, fill in the blank. The Process That Actually Works First question: Where the hell are we now? Where are we in relation to the thing we want? We need to know where we're starting from. Don't get overconfident and think you're further along than you are. Think about what qualities you have. Don't be shy about this - no one's going to read them. What do you know? What have you learned? What have you done before? What have other people said? Get a feeling for where you are now and all the good stuff you already have. Next question: What does what we want look like? And it's more than just looking. What would it look like when you've got it? What would you hear? How would that feel? You've got to know it feels right. Jump into the future and ask yourself - if I had it now, what would it feel like? What would it enable you to do? When you see the difference between where you are now and what it would look like, ask yourself: What do I need to bridge that gap? If this seems difficult, try this simple question: If this was really easy, what would that be like? Sometimes we overcomplicate things when the answer is right there. What You Need to Learn Everyone knows someone who's sure of themselves. They're grounded, strong, and they have that inner strength because they're sure of their abilities. So, what abilities do you need to learn? Where are you going to get them? Where are you going to learn them? Maybe it's getting the skill of talking, being able to open a conversation with somebody. That one little skill could change everything. Write these things down because you need to know what you need to learn. Start small. If you can do one small step, and you can because you want this, you know what it'll feel like, you've got the motivation, and if you master that one small step, you'll have confidence in your competence for that step. Taking Action That Counts Once you've got that goal in mind, you start taking action. It's an intuitive action, but also a thoughtful action. Continued action. As you do that, you become aware of where you are now because you've moved along the road toward your goal. You become flexible because you start thinking about what else you might need to learn. You're not rigid in your approach - you have flexibility because of your awareness and the action you're taking. You can also act as if you have it now. When you visualize yourself doing it, you'll know how you'll be in your physiology, how you'll walk, how you'll talk. You'll know your psychology, the way you think. The Ripple Effect Here's what's amazing - when you're aiming for this one thing and building self-assurance in this area, it generalises into other areas of your life. You become more self-assured in different areas you weren't even aware of. You might ...