5 Simple Tips to Become More Self-Confident

A lack of self-confidence is one of the biggest obstacles to reaching your goals and pursuing your passions and purpose. Each time you put yourself out to the world, it feels like a risk. But unless you do take that risk, you don't allow yourself to make your dreams a reality.

Self-confidence is a feeling of trust in your abilities, qualities and judgement. So, how do you build that trust in yourself?

1. Get in touch with how you feel when you're not confident. It can feel like anxiety, nervousness, fearfulness, worry or simply feeling resistant to taking an action.

Once you're clear on how it feels when you lack confidence, you want to shift into a better feeling place. Using our trusty law of attraction processes can come in handy here. Pre-paving is a process that allows you to rehearse a situation before it happens.

Pre-paving is simply feeling and thinking of everything going your way before an event occurs.

So, before publishing that novel, giving a presentation, going on a job interview or any situation where you want to feel confident, pre-pave by thinking of all the good things that you want to occur. Practice "skipping to the end" and getting in touch with how you expect to feel with everything working out for you. See in your mind's eye the events, people, and outcomes you want. Imagine yourself standing tall, feeling confident. See people smiling and nodding. Imagine yourself very relaxed and clear minded. Imagine the feeling of satisfaction you have with a happy outcome. The idea is to do a mental rehearsal that feels really good to you. Have fun and play with this!

2. Stop comparing yourself to others. You are a unique individual with your own contributions to make and your own timetable. Own that thought! Even if you think others are more accomplished than you, don't sell yourself short. I've been in several situations where I thought I was in over my head and others were better than me only to find out my contributions were deeply appreciated. You have your own style and it will resonate with your "tribe."

3. Pay attention to your thoughts. How much negative self-talk is going in your head? Shift your focus to what you DO like about yourself. What skills, talents or qualities do you have that you are proud of? Make a list of them and refer to it often. Remember you are a work in progress, so forgive any mistakes, look at what you learned from them and be proud of your growth.

4. Deliberately shift your thinking away from questions that drain confidence to questions that empower you. Instead of, "Why do I always feel this way?" try "How would I like to feel?" Instead of "Why does this always happen to me?" ask "What do I have to learn from this situation?"

5. Think back to times when you have felt confident. Even if you have to go way back in your history, there is a time when you felt confident. Bring that feeling of confidence into your body and practice it. If you really can't remember a time of feeling confident, imagine what confidence feels like and practice that.

You can train yourself to be more confident. Take small steps that are just outside of your comfort zone. You'll soon get the feedback that you can do and be more than you thought.

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Emotional Health - Eight Effective Strategies For Improving It

Emotional health means being able to regulate emotions and behavior under different circumstances. People, who are emotionally healthy, are able to handle life's challenges well, build strong relationships and recover quickly from setbacks.

Emotional health refers to overall psychological wellbeing of a person. It implies how we feel about ourselves. It is about being happy, self-confident, self-aware, and resilient. It greatly influences our ability to manage our feelings and emotions. And, therefore, it helps deal more efficiently with difficulties.

Anyone can suffer from emotional health problems and over a lifetime most of us will. Majority of us ignore the emotional messages that tell us something is wrong with us. But we try to tough out our emotional issues by distracting ourselves or self-medicating with alcohol, drugs, and other destructive behaviors. We bottle things up in the hope that others don't notice. But it is difficult to hide our emotional problems from others, especially when they become serious.

So, it is of utmost importance to protect our emotional health because it will not only give rise to many physical and mental illnesses in us but will also adversely affect those close to us.

Improving emotional health -

Below are enumerated some effective strategies for improving emotional health -

Connect with people - We humans are social creatures having overriding emotional need for positive connection with others. We are not meant to survive in isolation, let alone thrive. Interacting with another person can quickly put the brakes on stress and relax us. Find a supportive relationship with someone, who is a good listener. A good listener will listen to the feelings behind your words, and won't interrupt, judge, or criticize you. Such supportive relationships help you strengthen emotionally. Don't neglect your real-world relationships in favor of virtual interaction on TV or computer screens.

Get moving - The mind and the body are intrinsically linked. When you improve your physical health, you'll automatically experience greater emotional well-being. Regular exercise also releases endorphins -- powerful chemicals that lift your mood and provide added energy. Exercise also relieves stress, improves memory, and helps you to sleep better. You don't have to be a fitness fanatic to reap the benefits. Even modest amounts of exercise can make a big difference to your emotional health.

Manage stress- We are mostly not aware how our daily life feels stressful unless stress becomes overwhelming, thereby affecting quality of our life. While social interaction and exercise are excellent ways to relieve stress, other stress management strategies can help you bring things back into emotional balance. Techniques such as mindfulness meditation, deep breathing, or progressive muscle relaxation can put the brakes on stress and bring your mind and body back into a state of balance.

Eat healthy diet - What you eat has a direct impact on how you feel. Wholesome meals give you more energy and help you look better, resulting in a boost to physical and emotional health, while unhealthy food can take a toll on your brain and mood.

Give joyously - There is an undisputed connection between social relationships and greater mental and emotional health. The greatest benefit of social connection stems from the acts of giving to others. By measuring hormones and brain activity when people are being helpful to others, the researchers have discovered that being generous delivers immense pleasure to the giver. Just as we're hard-wired to be social, we're also hard-wired to give to others.

Invest in self-care - Investing in self-care is as much about caring for others as it is for you. Go to a funny movie, take a walk on the beach, read a good book, or talk to a friend. Fun and play is not an indulgence but a necessity for emotional and mental health. Enjoy the beauty of nature. Simply walking through a garden can lower blood pressure and reduce stress. The same goes for strolling through an art gallery, hiking, or sitting on a beach. Spend some money and time in buying some good clothes and items for grooming. As a matter of fact, an investment in self-care will pay good dividends in terms of happiness.

Develop mindfulness - Mindfulness is a mental state achieved by focusing one's awareness on the present moment. Simultaneously, we maintain a moment-by-moment awareness of our thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations and the surrounding environment. We do so non-judgmentally without attaching labels to anything. In fact, the practice of mindfulness in our daily activities gives us power to regulate our emotions, thereby enhancing emotional resilience.

Do meditations regularly - A new study from Michigan State University says that meditation can help tame your emotions even if you're not a mindful person. Those, who practice meditations regularly, recover quickly after a disturbing event because they have developed the ability to regulate their emotions. But there is a caveat that one should practice meditations regularly for emotional health benefits.

The bottom line -

Our emotional health is of paramount importance because our physical and mental health is closely associated with it. The above strategies are quite effective in improving our emotional health, if we employ them prudently in life.

Emotional health is of paramount importance as it is directly linked to our physical and mental health. Above effective strategies are likely to improve it if they are followed prudently.

                                 Download 25 Most Powerful Motivational Quotes

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7 Ways To Boost Your Self-Esteem Fast

Not everyone is self-confident, self-trusting or self-loving.

One of the major reasons is because they have not fully developed or nurtured their self-esteem.

Today, let me give you 7 easy tips on how you can boost your self-esteem fast!

Tip #1 Understand What Self-Esteem Is

Self-esteem is nothing more than having a clear understanding of your own strengths, weaknesses, likes and dislikes and being able to move your life forward with this level of self-knowledge.

It's about accepting your flaws and loving yourself anyway.

It's about focusing on things you can control, instead of things outside your influence.

It's about living in the present and being hopeful for the future, instead of dwelling on the past that cannot be undone.

Tip #2 The Major Cause of Poor Self-Esteem

Low self-esteem occurs when you attach too much of your personal value to the external materialistic things like money, fame, status, cars, mansions etc.

These things are nice to have, but never measure your own self of worthiness against these kinds of Hollywood-portrayed lifestyle.

Other things like health, skills, interpersonal relationships, life experiences, love and passion are also crucial to your well-being.

Tip #3 Remind Yourself What You're Already Good At

You're likely to already have 5, 10 or 20 years of solid experience where you've learnt some major life lessons.

Take 10-15 minutes to write down everything you know how to do. Do not judge whatever you write.

It can be things like playing piano, climbing trees, fishing, playing as the basketball captain in high school, repairing the toilet well etc.

It might sound silly, but remind yourself of the instructions, the stories and the lessons that had strengthened you as a human being.

Tip #4 Daily Night Journaling

Every night before you sleep, you should take just 5 minutes to write down the Top 3-5 Wins of the day.

You need to develop a habit of reminding yourself the mini achievements so that you know you're making progress every day.

Tip #5 Plan Your Tomorrow The Night Before

At the same time, you should plan your next day while doing your night-journaling.

List out your Big 3 things you must dominate in order to make your tomorrow awesome, so that you wake up automatically productive and know exactly what to execute on.

Tip #6 Stop Comparing Yourself To Others

Never compare your hard, boring, tough back stage of work with other people's glamorous, successful, enjoyable front stage of victory.

It's plainly unfair to both of you.

You don't know the complete story of rags-to-riches. You didn't witness the excruciating times of theirs. You had no idea how much they had gone through.

What you see is just a snapshot of their peak winning moment. Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat are creating a false image of ideal reality that does not exist.

Stop comparing and start focusing on making consistent daily improvements of your own life.

Tip #7 Be Grateful

No matter what happens, understand that everything happens for a reason and it serves you.

Your life is exactly where you should be. Trust the process and trust that the dots will somehow connect in the future.

Sit down, close your eyes, and remind yourself what 5 things you STILL have in life that you're grateful for.

Smile at them and keep going.

http://ezinearticles.com/?7-Ways-To-Boost-Your-Self-Esteem-Fast&id=9516505

5 Ways to Shake Off the Pain of Rejection

5. Set a hard deadline for letting it go.

Few things feel as painful as rejection. Regardless what form it takes—not being invited to a friend’s party, not being offered a position after an interview, having your actions criticized, or failure when you’re trying to sell your idea—every “no” indicates a door closed to us. Of course, the extent of the impact largely depends on the position of the individual receiving the rejection and the one doling it out, but most people struggle with finding the best way to regroup and recover.

Research tells us that not only does rejection give us a mental pause; it can also produce physical pain. Study findings published in Science magazine by researchers from Purdue University and the University of California, Los Angeles, in 2003 demonstrated that being socially shunned or turned down by others activates the same regions in our brains—the dorsal anterior cingulate and the anterior insula—that are associated with experiencing physical pain. Numerous successive studies have corroborated the similarities between rejection and physical pain. For example, a 2011 study

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 published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science demonstrated how pain experienced from hot coffee spilled on one's forearm is similar to the “pain” that they would experience from seeing a photograph of a former partner after an unwanted relationship breakup.

In short, it hurts.

Pain is not the only negative consequence of rejection; it can also lead us to feel more insecure in ourselves, our decisions, and our choices. Security is one of the most basic human needs, and when it is not fulfilled or is jeopardized by rejection, we start to doubt ourselves. Other aspects of rejection can include flagging concentration; increased levels of stress, irritability and aggression; inability to sleep and control one’s emotions; and gradual withdrawal from society, among others.

Not everyone copes with rejection in the same way: Studies show that people with a higher sense of self-worth, as well as individuals with more social power

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, handle rejection better than those with lower self-esteem and less social influence. There are salespeople who actually love cold-calling and think that every “no” just leads them closer to the next "yes."

People who highly value a sense of individuality also experience rejection less painfully than those whose need for being a part of the group is much stronger.

Similarly, self-confident people are able to use rejection to improve themselves

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, get more creative, and validate their beliefs.

Rejection is going to happen. It’s a fact of life that not all relationships and situations will work out well. With distance, we can often see that a rejection was a good thing for us but at the time, it doesn’t feel good. Developing more effective responses to rejection is an important life skill. If you find yourself unable to deal with rejection, you may need to work on building your self-confidence and your self-esteem and strengthening your social ties before addressing the anxiety, anger, and other issues that arise from being rejected.

1. Self-confidence is key.
   Of course you know that self-confidence is important, but knowing it’s important and having it are two different things. Many people have grown up in environments where they were told they were worthless or useless. These messages often carry over into adulthood and other relationships. If your self-confidence is flagging, start small to build it back. Make a list every day with at least two or three things you have done well, contributions you have made, or positive things you have done. Write these down and review them before you go to bed each night and again when you get up the next morning. Fill your nighttime and early morning brain with something positive about yourself.

   
   
2. Change to positive self-talk.
   Rejection will enhance whatever negative things you say to yourself, so practice different self-talk. Notice what you say to yourself; thoughts like “It’s all my fault” or “What is wrong with me?” are not useful and only bring you down. Rejection happens to everyone; even the most successful and confident people don’t always get what they want, but most of those people acknowledge the rejection as outside of them and don’t start telling themselves how terrible they really are. Notice what you say to yourself and choose to build yourself up, not tear yourself down.

   
   
3. Remember, this too shall pass.
   Remind yourself of this whenever you feel down. No, you are not worthless and you are not a failure: This is a point in time. Don’t let one disappointing experience diminish the worth of everything else that you have achieved. Give yourself credit for your skills and accomplishments, and remind yourself of all those experiences when you made good progress, solved a problem or helped someone. No one is defined by one experience.

   
   
4. Practice reframing.
   Take a deep breath, step back from the situation, and just breathe for a few minutes. Many times a situation seems worse because you react and then “frame it” as a negative about you. Instead, physically step back and begin deep breathing. Choose to reframe it. Instead of thinking, “No one will ever love me, I’m unlovable,” you could reframe by thinking, “Relationships are hard for everyone; I’m no different. This was hard for me but I can learn something from it. Let me focus on what I can learn.”

   
   
5. Let it go.
   It’s okay to feel upset about rejection. After all, you are human and you have emotional responses. Let yourself feel the pain, cry or pound a pillow, but then put a limit on how long you will mourn the rejection. Literally set a time frame: “I can mourn this until next Tuesday at 10:30 a.m. and then I will let go of it.” Let the emotions roll through you, but don’t let them park and become long-term visitors.

www.psychologytoday.com/blog/understand-other-people/201512/5-ways-shake-the-pain-rejection