TO USE THIS BOOK
We’ve divided this book into three parts (How Confident Are You? Why Do You Lack Confidence? How Can You Learn to be Confident?). In Part 1 you’ll gain a sense of how low your confidence really is by understanding the true meaning of confidence. You may indeed discover you’re not so bad after all. In Part 2 you’ll explore why you are the way you are, which will help you move on. Finally, in Part 3 we have lots of practical advice. To help you take immediate action we also have confidence boosters throughout the book so that you can work on your confidence immediately.
At the end of the first five chapters there are tests that will help you assess yourself. There are also key ‘Ask Yourself’ questions at the end of each chapter for you to reflect on so that you can relate each chapter to your personal experience. You will also find case studies, who are all real people (with names and identifying circumstances changed). Their journeys will help you see how it’s possible to overcome low confidence.
We interviewed two psychologists, two acting coaches, two life coaches and one neuroscientist, all of them top of their fields, and the best experts on confidence. Instead of just one perspective we wanted to tackle every aspect and show you how experts from different areas converge. We wanted to create a Psychologies perspective on Real Confidence that is multidimensional, giving you an all-round, thorough approach. We hope that through this you are able to stop seeing lack of confidence as a problem that is an obstacle to your happiness.
OUR EXPERTS
Annie Ashdown, Harley Street business and personal development coach, clinical hypnotherapist, and intuitive
Ashdown’s clients include CEOs, lawyers, entrepreneurs, diplomats, doctors, corporate employees, top achievers in business, celebrities and teenagers.
She is the author of Doormat Nor Diva Be – How to Take Back Control of your Life and Relationships (Infinite Ideas) and The Confidence Factor – 7 Secrets of Successful People (Crimson Publishing).
Dr Ilona Boniwell, founder of the European Network of Positive Psychology, head of the International MSc in Applied Positive Psychology at Anglia Ruskin University (UK and France) and head of training consultancy Positran
Boniwell has been involved in helping the government of Bhutan develop a framework for happiness-based public policy. She has contributed to, edited and written several books. Her latest as an author is Oxford Handbook of Happiness (Oxford University Press) and positive psychology tools, such as Strength Cards and The Happiness Box (Positran).
Dawn Breslin, life coach, TV presenter and author
Breslin’s extensive TV work includes presenter and confidence-building expert for GMTV, and presenter for Discovery Channel’s Life Coach Series. She helps people from all walks of life repair their self-esteem and rebuild their confidence.
She is the author of three books, Zest for Life, Super Confidence and The Power Book (Hay House) and was a consultant on Lorraine Kelly’s book, Real Life Solutions (Century).
Dr Nitasha Buldeo, research scientist in biophysiology
Buldeo is qualified in health sciences and psychology, neuroscience, nutrition and NLP. As a product-innovator and entrepreneur she has been awarded scholarships from the UK Department of Trade and Industry to study at the Kellogg School of Management in Chicago, USA. She was also awarded a scholarship at business school, Cranfield School of Management.
Chamorro-Premuzic advises clients in financial services, media, consumer, fashion and government and appears regularly on news channels including the BBC, CNN and Sky. He is the author of eight books, including his latest Confidence: The Surprising Truth About How Much You Need and How to Get It (Profile Books).
Niki Flacks, award-winning veteran Broadway actress, director, acting/corporate training coach, psychologist, therapist, founder of the Bergerac Company
Flacks, also a former assistant professor in theatre at Southern Methodist University, fuses psychology and neuroscience to help actors handle nerves and create authentic characters. Her flagship programme for corporations is Power Talk, which trains employees in overcoming fear of public speaking. She is the author of Acting with Passion (Bloomsbury Methuen Drama).
Patsy Rodenburg OBE, Head of Voice at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, leadership coach
Rodenburg was former Head of Voice at the Royal National Theatre, and works with the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Royal Court, the Donmar and Almeida theatres, as well as A-list stars. She travels all over the world coaching business leaders, athletes and politicians. She is the author of five books including Presence (Penguin).
1
HOW CONFIDENT ARE YOU?
CHAPTER 1
DEFINING CONFIDENCE – IS IT WHAT YOU THINK IT IS?
We suspect you believe lack of confidence is the reason certain aspects of your life are not working out the way they do for everyone else who has confidence. You don’t blame anyone else for not earning more money, or not finding a job post-redundancy, or not finding love after divorce, or not buying a home, or not having children, or not changing careers, or not losing weight, or not getting fit, or not making new friends. This feeling, that it’s your fault, that it’s all because you’ve got no confidence, is very common. You’re not alone. Lacking confidence doesn’t feel good. You feel like there’s some screw missing from the intricate parts of your brain, or there’s a malfunction in your brain’s software, right? If you could just fix that, if there was a confidence app for your brain you’d be fine, right?
Confidence has become the holy grail of modern life. It’s not just the big concepts like success and happiness that we’ve come to believe depend on confidence, somehow we think that it’s the foundation to our inner structure, that it’s what would enable us to create our ideal outer lives.
But do we even know what it really is? Unless you really know what confidence is, how can you develop it? What is it?
Analysing the meaning of confidence prompts fascinating discussions. Let’s start with the Oxford English Dictionary definition. Here we see that one aspect of the meaning
