Confidence -as easy as keeping your word to yourself?

Confidence - everyone wants it, but what is it? And how do you get it?

It's an elusive concept and even more elusive attribute.

Many definitions exist:

Confidence -

• the feeling or belief that one can rely on something or someone; firm trust.

• the state of feeling certain about the truth of something.

• a feeling of self-assurance arising from one's appreciation of one's own abilities or qualities.

• feeling sure of yourself and your abilities — not in an arrogant way, but in a realistic, secure way. Confidence isn't about feeling superior to others. It's a quiet inner knowledge that you're capable. Confident people: feel secure rather than insecure.

Self assurance, being secure in oneself - affirmations, preparation, practice, knowing what to expect, feeling physically comfortable, having successfully completed a task before... all these things are common answers to creating confidence. They're great. For sure, let's all please keep on doing these.

But I recently came upon two new realizations to add to the list!

1) You build confidence by building trust in yourself - by keeping your word to yourself. The more you show up for yourself and respect the promises you make to yourself, the more confident you'll be. Not only consciously, but your subconscious will begin to trust everything you say more deeply, which empowers your affirmations and goal setting.

• So, don't hit snooze. Don't make excuses. If you aren't sure you'll do something, then it's better to NOT say you will because once you do, breaking your trust with yourself has farther reaching consequences than you know.

• If you've had difficulty working out 20 minutes every day, change it to 5 days for 5 minutes. Only make promises you can and will keep.

Small thing, but it has a huge impact. Start on this one today. And guess what, if you won't do something, that's fine! Just be honest with yourself! The only one who will know about it is you. It's better to be truthful with yourself, and be ok with not doing something that you weren't going to do anyway. It's not being optimistic or positive to promise yourself and not show up. It's being unfaithful to yourself. Just stop. You're 100% in control of what you say and do. Only say true things, and do the things you say. That's it.

2) Remember thoughts are not real. Your thinking comes from your mind, and often just imagination. Being secure in oneself is a core facet of confidence. Often, insecurity comes from being afraid of others' judgment. It comes from wondering what other people might think of you. Odds are, insecure thoughts often sound like "What if... so and so.. thinks...?" It hasn't happened, maybe will never happen and is entirely fabricated in your mind.

Guess what, judgment happens and you can't stop it, not in your own mind and not in others! It's completely uncontrollable... so stop worrying about what you can't control. It's kind of like the weather. Do you worry about whether it might rain tomorrow? Probably not, at most, you'll check to make sure you bring an umbrella, or reschedule an outdoor event. You don't worry about it, because you can't change it. You adapt to it or you ignore it. There's no sense in worrying about things you can't change. Apply that mentality here.

Let's think about a classic example of extreme confidence without the skill to support it. William Hung. He used his confidence to get what he wanted, and he achieved his goals against all odds! Incredible! Terrible singer, lots of haters and some say he "made a fool of himself" on American Idol. But guess what? William Hung is a celebrity and made his lifelong dreams come true of being on TV and a singer. He's made significant sums of money. He didn't let the anxiety of being judged or being a bad singer stop him from achieving his goals. He's happy. He's successful. A lot of people judged him, but he got what he wanted anyway.

Would you rather be William Hung, happy, famous, successful? Or XYZ Nobody leading a normal life, who CAN sing well and has those same dreams but never tried for American Idol because XYZ was afraid of being judged, was insecure and afraid of failure?

Maybe it's similar to the adage "Fake it till you make it." But, no matter what you want to do, or what extremes you'll take it to, your confidence will be improved if you don't let fear of judgment effect your behavior. So, take that "but what if..." thought from your head and throw it away. It doesn't serve you. Think only about what YOU want, and how you can set yourself on the path to achieving it.

So, let's all just agree to sleep in tomorrow because we'll never use that snooze again. And when we wake, we'll do one thing to start toward what we've always wanted to do but didn't have the confidence we could.

Happy Friday!