Looking good can undoubtedly make you feel good about yourself. However, good-looking people also possess their own insecurities. Furthermore, we know that appearances can change as you grow. Therefore, why should your self-esteem be solely determined by how you look?

What we all need is confidence. It’s a powerful word and an even more powerful feeling. Can you remember a time in your life when you felt confident? A time when you felt unstoppable… on top of the world? Now imagine you could feel that way more often. What impact would that have on your life?

Let’s take a look at this infographic which illustrates the differences between a confident person and an insecure person:

The good news is, there are steps to building confidence that you can take wherever – and whenever you feel you’re lacking it. Often, it’s already within you and you just need a few strategies to uncover it.

How to Be More Confident (A Step-By-Step Guide)

So, how can you be more confident? P.S.: No plastic surgery required.

1. Be specific

First things first, let’s get specific.

In order to tame the demon, you’ve got to name the demon. Ask yourself these questions.

• Where do you lack confidence?
• When do you feel self-doubt and your negative emotions creeping in?
• Where do you feel your skills or abilities are limiting you?
• Where would you like to have more confidence?

Take a moment now, identify and put into a complete statement: Where do you specifically want to have more confidence?

2. Uncover what gives you confidence

This is personal, so it will vary from person to person. There’s no one-size-fits-all approach to confidence and what works for one, won’t always work for another.

Here’s how you can figure out.

Recall the couple of times in your life when you felt most confident.

Think about what was it about those times that made you feel so empowered. Was it the environment you were in? Something you were doing? A feeling you had? The clearer you get about this, the easier it will be to tap into the confidence within you.

3. Be true to ‘you’

One of the surest ways to lose confidence is to try to be someone else. So, be true to yourself. It is only in your own skin that you can be confident.

When you’re trying to be someone you’re not, every part of you resists it. You will feel like a fraud and a hypocrite. You are not everyone else. You are you. And the more you can understand who you are and what you value, the stronger you will be. You are capable of changing your life! When you stray away from who you are, you lose confidence because it’s ‘just not you’.

Think about what makes you, uniquely you. Write it down. Think about what you value and what’s important to you. Write that down, too.

4. Remember you are 100% smart

When one of my daughters was in 4th grade, her teacher gave an assignment called 100% smart. In this activity, the kids had to make a pie chart and identify what percentage smart they were in each of the following areas; people, self, body, math, word, music, art. Whatever it is, they all add up to 100%.

This is true for everyone. So, maybe you’re not the best public speaker, but are you a good listener, a responsible sibling or a caring senior who can encourage your peers?

Too many people spend way too much time trying to improve, change, be more of this or less of that. Instead, what if you spent more time acknowledging your talents, skills and successes?

Try this for one week: at the end of each day, write down at least 3 things that you did well, felt good about, or were proud of yourself for. Know your strengths, know your talents and know you’re 100% smart.

5. Stop comparing yourself

Nothing zaps your confidence more than comparing yourself to others. Especially now, with social media and the wonderful opportunity to judge yourself against so many others! Lack of confidence comes from a gap in where you see yourself and where you think you should be.

Stop comparing yourself to others. Just stop. If you still feel a compelling need to compare – compare yourself to yourself. Measure how far you’ve come. See how much improvement you’ve made. Acknowledge your wins and successes.

6. Realize you are enough

This may sound a little bit corny, but try it. This positive affirmation will resonate at a deep level and have a powerful effect on your subconscious.

Every day for the next 21 days, repeat this mantra “I am enough.” Don’t just say it, but feel it, deeply, at the core of who you are.

Want to get more specific? Replace ‘enough’ with whatever word you’d like to ‘be’. What would give you the most confidence?

I am brave. I am strong. I am smart. I am beautiful. I am confident. I got this.

7. Acquire new skills

Since confidence is often directly linked to abilities, one of the best ways to build your confidence is to get new skills or experience and step out of your comfort zone.

Growing your skills will in turn grow your confidence. And please, as you work on building your skills and expertise, don’t mistake a lack of perfection for a lack of ability. No one is perfect. But if you’ve got a perfectionist bone in your body (like I do), it can make you think that just because you’re not the best, that you’re not good at all.

Make sure to check yourself – am I really not good at this, or am I not good as I want to be just yet?
How?
Ask yourself: Is there a specific area where you are lacking confidence? How can you expand your expertise in this area?

8. Change your state

Changing your physical and mental ‘state’ is one of the quickest ways to access a feeling of confidence. To do this, you need to know what the state of ‘confidence’ looks, feels and sounds like for you.

How?
Here are a few strategies you can use to access that:
• Remember – Think of a specific time, associated with feeling confident. Sink into that feeling deeply and moment by moment relive every detail.
• Imagine – Imagine how you would feel if you were confident. How would you act? Feel? Be?
• Modelling – Think about someone you know who exudes confidence. Imagine what that person would do.

9. Find yourself a cheerleader

Yes, while I understand confidence is a state from within, you can also boost your confidence by the people you choose to spend your time with.

How?
Make a concerted effort to surround yourself with others who provide encouragement, positivity, and inspiration. Spend more time with people who ‘get you’ and see all of your greatness, and less time with those that zap your confidence or cause you to feel self-doubt.

10. Just do it

When Nike came up with this slogan in the late 80’s, they knew just how to get the general population off their butts and moving. Turns out, this is a great strategy for being more confident too.

When you stand at the edge of the water; waiting, wondering, worrying if you can do something, you lose confidence. Your fears creep in and you begin to doubt yourself. But when you take a leap of faith, jump in and get started, your confidence immediately builds.

Action builds confidence and each step you take builds it further.

Think of one step you could take right now that would get you moving in the right direction. Then Just Do It and see what happens. An incredible thing about human brain is that once it realizes something is working, it will keep that momentum going!

Final Thoughts

Being more confident starts with one thing — YOU.

YOU making the decision to take action. And when all else fails, YOU can make a choice.

YOU can choose to be confident. YOU can choose confidence over fear and self-doubt.

Your mind believes what you tell it. If you continue to tell yourself the story that you are not confident, you will believe it and your self-doubt will continue. But if you tell yourself you can do it, that you got this, your mind will believe that too.

Remember, fostering a strong sense of confidence is critical to experiencing overall levels of health, happiness and success.

And once you get started, you’ll be unstoppable. Be brave. Be confident. You got this.

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Source: https://www.lifehack.org/683919/how-to-be-more-confident-the-definitive-step-by-step-guide

Do you have a dream but are often told that it is an impossible one to achieve?

Being a K-pop star seems like an insurmountable task. However, there are still K-pop trainees who manage to achieve their goals. They persevere during gruelling trainings because they possess the correct mindset – the growth mindset.

Remember the story of the tortoise and the hare?

The hare was so certain that he would win that he sat down and went to sleep during the race.

The tortoise just plodded on and kept going, always thinking that he had a chance of winning. When the hare woke up in horror that the tortoise was ahead of him, he started running as fast as he could, but he was just too late; the tortoise had won.

So, what made the outcome of the story unexpected? It’s got everything to do with mindsets.

The hare had a fixed mindset. He believed that his innate ability would always mean that he would win any race no matter what he did.

The tortoise had a growth mindset. He believed that he needed to work hard and keep going at it consistently if he wanted to win. He was also not afraid of failure or he would never have agreed to race the hare.

What is Fixed or Growth Mindset?

These two different beliefs lead to different behaviour, and also to different results. For example, students with a growth mindset were shown to increase their grades over time. Those who believed that their intelligence was ingrained did not; in fact, their grades got worse.

People with these two mindsets actually think differently and also react to information differently.

In particular, they respond differently to information about performance.

In people with a fixed mindset, the brain is most active when they are being given information about how well they have done, for example, test results or grades.

In people with a growth mindset, the brain is most active when they are being told what they could do to improve.

Dealing with Setbacks

These mindsets also cause people to deal with setbacks differently.

People with a fixed mindset are very discouraged by setbacks, because a setback dents their belief in their ability. They tend to become uninterested and give up.

People with a growth mindset view a setback as an opportunity to learn. They tend to try harder in an effort to overcome the problem.

“The moment that we believe that success is determined by an ingrained level of ability, we will be brittle in the face of adversity”

Mindsets in Life

Mindsets are not just important for learning new skills. They can affect the way that we think about everything.

For example, a growth mindset can help you recover from illness because you believe that you can do something about the illness. They can help you achieve in sport, at work and can also help you grow and develop in relationships.

Which mindset do you have today? It is never too late to develop the growth mindset in you. Here is what you can do…

Yes, hard work, effort, and persistence are all important, but not as important as having that underlying belief that you are in control of your own destiny. Having a growth mindset (the belief that you are in control of your own ability, and can learn and improve) is the key to success. Cultivating a growth mindset could be the single most important thing you ever do to help you achieve success.

What are some of the things you can say to yourself that will help you cultivate a growth mindset?

If you are a student leader, what can you say to your peers to help them believe that skills, intellect and talents can be developed?

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Why do people fall for such scams? How do we avoid being victims of scams?

Manipulative and conniving scammers take advantage of our emotions such as greed, fear and sympathy. A moment of weakness or impulsiveness on our part could lead to our downfall. When one is in his vulnerable and lonely state, he could fall into a trap of deceit unwittingly.

As such, it is important to heighten our awareness of the different types of scams happening in society, and be armed against the traps that might manifest in your conversations with cyber contacts. Share the stories with your loved ones to ensure that they are wary of such scams! Visit https://www.scamalert.sg/news to read the scam stories.

How can we be more cyber savvy?

1. Create a safer online space by reviewing your cyber contacts

Cyber contacts are people whom we interact with online. It is difficult to know the real identity of our cyber contacts as they can pretend to be someone they are not. Some cyber contacts could be strangers and there could be potential dangers if they are not truthful. Thus, it is important to distinguish between friends in the real world and friends whom we have only met in cyberspace.

Source: https://ictconnection.moe.edu.sg/cyber-wellness/cyber-wellness-101/cyber-contacts

2. Practise discretion

The information that you posted could be misused and abused easily by others. Therefore, it is important to be careful about what you reveal online.

Source: https://ictconnection.moe.edu.sg/cyber-wellness/cyber-wellness-101/online-identity-and-expression

Apply the Cyber Wellness principles

To navigate in the cyberspace safely, apply the Cyber Wellness principles so that you can make the online (and offline) experience a more pleasant one for everyone.

Source: https://www.moe.gov.sg/education/programmes/social-and-emotional-learning/cyber-wellness

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Cosplay Therapy – How masquerading as your favourite character can help you improve your mental health and confidence!

If you think cosplaying is a hobby for only extroverts, you are wrong!

At Cityscape Counseling in Chicago, cosplay is used to help adolescents and young adults manage issues such as anxiety, depression, self-esteem, trauma and gender identity issues in a safe and creative environment. In fact, many introverts are involved in cosplaying. Here are the numerous benefits of cosplaying:

1. Cosplay can develop better confidence and self-esteem.

The cosplaying community is known to be supportive and encouraging. Being involved in a cosplay event will make one feel immediately belonged to a community. Cosplayers are often approached for photo-taking opportunities and they are affirmed of their efforts constantly by other participants. They attract positive attention and garner positive reinforcements from others. These greatly encourage the cosplayers and hence improve their confidence and self-esteem.

2. Cosplay helps with managing anxiety in social settings.

Not everyone is comfortable with meeting new people. Dressing up as another character gives the cosplayer a chance to adopt a new identity. It gives them a mask to safely hide behind, making anxieties and social situations more manageable. As a cosplayer, it is important to be ‘in character’ and hence when someone unfamiliar approaches, there is no pressure to act in a certain way to feel accepted.

3. Cosplay is an inclusive hobby.

Cosplaying is indeed a hobby which is all-encompassing and transformative, externally and internally. Some cosplayers in wheelchairs transform the chair into part of their costumes. Noticeable differences in physical capabilities are capitalised as opportunities for conversations. There are also several cosplayers who are advanced in years and still enjoy donning up costumes of their favourite characters. Age is just a number. Cosplay allows anyone to feel belonged, regardless of your age, gender, sexuality or religion.

4. Cosplay nurtures creativity.

The elaborate costumes for cosplaying can be quite expensive. To save money, many cosplayers use their creativity to create their desired costumes. People can get very creative using materials found easily in their homes. This might be the reason why some people regard cosplaying as a performative art. Instead of simply putting your art up for others to see, you’re a part of it and are wearing it. Cosplayers are known to take pride in their outfits.

A successful cosplayer is someone who is able to mimic the selected character as realistically as possible. Sometimes, this might lead cosplayers into trouble. In Singapore, there was a cosplay fan who received a $1000 fine for behaving suspiciously with a replica gun in public in 2015.

To make sure that cosplaying remains an enjoyable activity, here are some guidelines to cosplaying in Singapore:

1. Avoid generating alarm

If you are bringing along a prop, e.g. a gun replica or sword which looks like a real weapon, please ensure to have it wrapped up or covered before heading out. Props can cause public alarm if not handled properly. Offenders can be arrested and prosecuted.

Refrain from wearing controversial costumes. Premises’ management, including transportation facilities, may deny you entry, depending on your costume (e.g. cosplayers wearing masks). Please do not wear masks on public transport or in places too far away from anime/cosplay events. You are advised to don your costume only when you arrive at the cosplay venue. Or you can just simply take a taxi or private hire to avoid all the unnecessary fuss.

2. Avoid being a public nuisance

When out in public or at events, please do not direct or point your prop(s) randomly at anyone. Behave appropriately at non-event venues and avoid posing inconvenience to others.

3. Avoid breaking any laws

Cosplayers shall stick to their gender stated on their IC (not the gender they are cosplaying) when visiting the restrooms, i.e. a man shall not enter a ladies restroom just because he is dressed as a lady. If that happens, and a lady happens to be coincidentally in the restroom, that can amount to Insulting the Modesty of the lady.

Now that you have learnt more about cosplaying and are aware of the guidelines to cosplaying, who would you want to cosplay as? If you play games, have you considered bringing your avatar to life? Remember to use your creativity (so that it can be budget-friendly!) and have fun during the transformation!

Sources:

Cityscape Counseling – Cosplay Therapy

Alvinology – Cosplay Guidelines

“When people go through the process of decluttering, they feel a sense of freedom and liberation. It’s a reclaiming of a sense of mastery and control. They feel more competent and efficient.”

Tidying up can help you de-stress, gain a sense of control, and improve your state of mind in numerous ways.

We’re living in a time when many of us feel overloaded with stress. Yet many of us don’t realize how our personal habits may be contributing to our angst and anxiety.

For one thing, clutter and messiness can cause distress, which may be part of the reason why the Marie Kondo tidying method and minimalism trends dominate the headlines in wellness news more and more. After all, decluttering (the process of putting the miscellaneous physical things around you away where they belong) not only makes it easier to find what you’re looking for, it can also improve your mood and state of mind in myriad ways.

“It gives people a renewed sense of control over their environment,” explains Catherine Roster, PhD, a professor of management at the Anderson School of Management at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, who has studied the effect clutter has on our psychological well-being.

Why does clutter affect our emotional well-being?

Clutter reflects an excess of possessions that collectively create chaotic and disorderly living spaces.

Clutter is often the result of an over-attachment to our personal items, which makes it difficult to part with them. It isn’t abundance that’s the problem as much as attachment to abundance.

Procrastination and indecision can be caused by the presence of clutter.

Clutter can have a negative effect on well-being and happiness. Though “home” is typically considered a safe and secure place, clutter compromises some of that security, according to survey responses.

When there is clutter, you lose control over your physical environment, which can be very defeating and this can bring on stress, depression, or anxiety.

Clutter can also be a safety hazard if there are items or wires on the floor that someone can trip over, or a health hazard if your piles of stuff have become magnets for dust or bugs.

In addition, clutter can become a source of tension or friction between people in the same household — especially if they have different ideas about what’s acceptable when it comes to tidiness.

It can take a toll on your social life when you won’t invite people to your house as you are embarrassed of your place.

There is even some evidence that being in a cluttered space over time could affect your weight. A study published in January 2016 in the journal Environment and Behavior found that spending time in a chaotic, messy kitchen can contribute to an out-of-control mindset, and people in that type of kitchen chose higher-calorie snacks than people in a neater kitchen.

Why is there a need to declutter?

“Clutter is ‘in the eye of the beholder’ in the sense that some clutter might perturb some people and be totally fine for others,” explains Dr Darby Saxbe, PhD, an associate professor of psychology and the director of the Center for the Changing Family at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.

However, no matter what you physically count as “clutter,” whatever is in your environment is a constant visual reminder of things that need to be done.

Decluttering allows you to cross things off the to-do list, which gives you a sense of accomplishment. Removing clutter also takes away visual interruptions. It’s an easy way to ‘cleanse the palate’ and have a fresh start.

Reducing the number of items in the house and getting organized also promotes greater productivity, a sense of order, and feelings of self-efficacy, as well as improving your mood. Hence, you can regard tidying up, putting things away, and getting rid of piles of unnecessary stuff as a way of “managing symbolic pollution”.

When can decluttering go overboard?

Of course, you can take anything to an extreme level, so if decluttering becomes an obsession or you become super strict about having everything in a specific place, you can go overboard. If decluttering is keeping you from turning your attention to other things in your life, that’s not helpful or adaptive.

In other words, it’s important to find what works for you in this realm and be flexible enough to relinquish the reins of control when appropriate (whether that’s over a weekend or special occasion or in certain places in your home or office). But it’s worth the effort to find your personal sweet spot, because in the right amount, decluttering can be good for your mental and emotional well-being in many ways.

And in that respect, decluttering can certainly be a form of self-care. (Remember self-care is anything that promotes your health and well-being and that you simultaneously enjoy doing.)

There’s still more work to be done in the field of positive psychology to better define the potential benefits of decluttering. Dr Roster adds that: “It’s a form of self-care, just as not doing it is a form of diminishing the self.”

What can you do to improve your living space(s)?

Source: https://www.everydayhealth.com/healthy-living/why-decluttering-is-important-for-self-care-and-when-it-isnt/

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