Today’s episode of the podcast is a solo episode where I am sharing with you the 3 easy things that you can do today to boost your confidence.

These steps will help you stop doubting yourself, go after big opportunities, and make your dream life and business a reality.  

KEY TAKEAWAYS COVERED IN THE PODCAST

1. The importance of self-integrity in confidence
2. How to build confidence through small steps and self-compassion
3. Practical actions to take to become more confident

  If you enjoyed this episode then please feel free to go and share it on your social media or head over to Apple podcasts or Spotify and give me a review, I would be so very grateful.  

LINKS TO RESOURCES MENTIONED IN TODAY’S EPISODE

Join me at my Atomicon 'Build Your Confidence and Become Unstoppable' workshop Connect with Teresa on Instagram, LinkedIn or Facebook  

Transcript

What would you do and how would your business look if you had buckets of confidence? If you could go into every task, every launch, every promotion, every anything, speaking on stages, doing podcast interviews, putting yourself forward, with the utmost of confidence, how could your life change? In today's episode, I'm going to be sharing with you exactly how to do that, how you can build your confidence muscle. So that you are no longer held back by self doubt and you don't let those things get in your way. I'm going to be sharing with you three things that you can start to do today to build your self confidence. Hello, and welcome to this week's episode of Your Dream Business Podcast. How are you doing? If you are new to the podcast, thank you so much for listening. And if you are a returning listener, thank you so much for coming back. Today I want to talk to you about confidence. It's something that I'm actually doing a presentation on very soon. I'm doing a bit of a workshop on it, and it's something that comes up a lot in everything we do. You see, when I started my business, I knew how to do marketing. That was my thing. I had been to university. I've got a degree in it. I had worked in lots of businesses. I had marketed almost every possible type of industry you can imagine. And then I started helping small business owners. And I really quickly realized that without some of the mindset tools in place and one of them being confidence. We could have the best strategies in the world. And at the point I'm recording this, I'm actually doing this for me as much as you lot, because there are points in my business and things that I do where I need more confidence. And you might look at that and think, that seems crazy. You have loads of confidence. You do things that take a lot of confidence, like speaking on stages, putting the podcast out. putting yourself out there, but it doesn't mean that it's always fine and I'm always confident. But when we have confidence, it is honestly the game changer, because when we let not having confidence stop us, we've got nowhere to go with that. And if we can just have a bit of confidence to go out and do a thing, We can achieve amazing things. We can earn more money. We can launch the service that we want or the business that we want. We will be more successful. There's no doubt about it. We will put ourselves out there and we can honestly achieve amazing things. If you want to be more confident, or maybe, you know, one of your business friends that actually would benefit from listening to this, I think I would love you to go and share it with them. Obviously listen first, but make sure you share this episode with them after you've listened, because I think we could all do with some more confidence in our life. So let's talk about confidence. What even is confidence? Confidence often comes down to believing in ourselves, believing that we can do something. And I think a lot of us think that we should just have it, or it should just come, or maybe it's something you're born with and You're just either confident or you're not. And that is not the case at all. Confidence, like most mindset things, is a muscle that you need to work on and that you need to improve over time. Confidence can often come down to keeping promises that we make with ourselves and self integrity, which might feel like, okay, you've gone on a bit of a curve ball there, Teresa, but seriously, imagine if you are making some promises to yourself and you say, I'm going to do this today, or I'm going to show up this way and you don't. That can remove your own self confidence because having the confidence to do something that you set yourself or something that you want to do should be a given. But when we're not doing that and lots of us don't do it and I don't do it, you know, that that self integrity piece Every bit of mindset thing that I do, so many times it comes back to the self integrity, so many times it comes back to, if we can't make and keep promises to ourself, then we're kind of really messing up other things. So for me, confidence, one part of confidence is Do we keep the promises that we make to ourselves and do we have a level of self integrity? So that's the first thing I want you to think about. When did you last make a promise to yourself and break it? Or when did you last make a promise to yourself and keep it? And I think I just wanted to kind of slot this in as a bit of a side because although it is connected to confidence, it's not the main area I want to focus on. However, the self integrity piece is so important. Also the other thing that comes in to this whole confidence conversation is the growth mindset versus a fixed mindset. If you don't believe you can change, if you don't believe that you can improve something, i. e. your confidence, then your brain is going to prove you right. So if you sit there and think, I'll never be confident at this, you will never be confident at it. So that's another thing I want you to think about just as we get into this confidence conversation, how much are you telling yourself and your brain, I can't do this, I'll never have that confidence, I will never be confident enough to do this. Because the more you keep telling yourself, the more your brain will keep proving you right. So you really need to think about on the very kind of base level of, how can I start to believe that I can be confident or become more confident? Okay, so you might sit there and think, this is easy for you to say, Teresa, you are super confident and everything you probably do now, you don't get nervous about. That is not the case at all. So first off, I was never like this, like, as I started my business, this was not something that I did. For those of you who know my story, how I started my business, I was very much back up against a wall, had to make some money and I started my business. So it wasn't, there was confidence wasn't even in it at that point. It was literally a case of, I needed to earn money and survive. However, as I started to put myself out there, that's when the confidence thing started to really play a role in my business and who I was. So just to make you feel a bit happier, if you're sat here thinking, I don't have confidence, or I don't have the confidence you have, Teresa, I want to tell you of a couple of instances when I first started my business. I remember going to a networking event. It was an all female networking event, and we had to do the 60 second thing. We had to go round the tables. And I, remember sitting there feeling physically sick at the thought of what I was going to say. And actually, I don't know why I'm laughing because it wasn't funny at the time, but I ended up saying something really stupid and didn't come across very well because I was so scared. Then my very first speaking gig in the States, I was over in Minneapolis. I spoke for Leadpages and there's Speaker before me who was Pat Flynn. And I used to get this thing every time I had something big and important in my world, like a speaking gig, I'd get a sore throat really random. And I'll, you know, could talk about that separately on another time, but I used to get a sore throat. So I'm running up to doing the speaking gig. I was out there a couple of nights before, and I started getting a sore throat and my throat was really, like my voice didn't sound great. And the morning of the speaking gig. And I'd prepared and I'd worked really hard at it and I'd spoken other places, but nothing as big as this, the morning of the speaking gig, I do a call with my husband on FaceTime or whatever. And also with my assistant who was back in the UK and both of them separately were freaking out on my behalf because I was freaking out. Like. They genuinely thought it was going to be a disaster. They actually thought I would fall apart or not even get on the stage or it would just go terribly because I was absolutely freaking out. Like, I don't think I've ever been so scared, ever been so nervous, ever thought I was going to mess something up so royally. Now, just to let you know, up until the point of getting on stage, I genuinely thought I was going to pee my pants. I actually said to, we had a concierge that looked after us, which was amazing. It was an amazing event. And I actually said to the guy who was looking after me, what if I get on stage and I pee my pants? Like, this is when you're so nervous, just any old rubbish is coming out of your mouth. And he was really sweet, and he was like, well, I guess that's never been done before. And we just kind of laughed about it. But I genuinely thought I was gonna get on stage and die because it was so terrifying. There was no confidence in there whatsoever. So, when I sit and talk to you about this stuff, this is not coming from a place of, I've got it all sussed, I know what I'm doing, I'm super confident. I have had to work at this as much as anyone else has had to work at it. And over time, it has increased. And yes, I don't feel like that now. I still get nervous when I speak on stage. And I am very grateful of that because I know I care about it. If I didn't get nervous, if I was so confident that I would just get on stage and it'd be amazing and I don't have to try and I don't have to be nervous, then that falls into arrogance and I don't ever want to be like that. I still want to be nervous. I still want an element of, I want to do a good job. However, I am confident that I will do my best at doing a good job. So even though the confidence is different, it's not that I'm, don't have confidence. I do have confidence that I'm a good speaker and will do a good job. However, I'm still nervous that I want to do a good job. Okay. So how do we build this confidence? How do you, if you're sat there listening to this going, yes, Teresa, but I want to start that thing and I'm terrified to do it. I want to, Apply for something. And I'm really scared. How do we actually go ahead and do it? So one of the first things that we need to not do before we get into the steps of what we can do is we can't rely on others to build our confidence for us. So often this comes a lot when we talk about how successful you think you are, or how good at something you think you are, this often can come down to when someone buys from you, when someone says you're good, when someone does something, you then feel good about it, you then feel confident, you then feel I've got a good product because someone else has said it, or I'm really good at what I do because someone else has said it. We can't rely on that. Not at all. Because as you well know, if you've been in business for a while, you are not for everyone. And I am not for everyone. And that is okay. So someone is going to look at you and what you do and go, no, I don't like it. And I think you're terrible. They probably need to do some work on themselves if they're going to say that. But. You can't control what other people are going to say and do. So if you are relying on others for your self confidence, for you to be able to put yourself out there, that is not a great place to start. So this has got to be something we do inside. This is something we've got to have internally that is not affected by external stuff. Now don't get me wrong. I flipping love it when people tell me they liked my talk or they thought the training I did was brilliant, or they love the podcast. Please come and tell me you love the podcast because I do genuinely love it. And when you're sat in your office, just talking to yourself, sometimes, you know, it can feel like you're talking to a void. So we love that. And that's awesome. However, if no one came and did that, am I confident that I still do a good job? Yes, I am. If someone came to me and said, I thought your podcast is awful. Would that then make me lose my confidence? No, it wouldn't. Because all I would think is you're not for me and I'm not for you. And that's okay. There's lots of other podcasts out there. So it's very much about having that confidence internally that, you know, no matter what anybody else says, that actually you will still be fine and still carry on, whether that thing is a good thing or a bad thing. Okay. So how are we going to become more confident? First thing I want you to try and make 1 percent changes. Often when we do something, we think it needs to be radical. We think that, you know, becoming confident means going from zero to a hundred. And that might not be possible. Now, if it is brilliant, do it. Let's give it a go. However, for lots of us and for lots of people, that is not possible. You can't just go, I've got no confidence. I'm going to do it. So where can we make the1 percent changes? And if you've been a listener to the podcast, you know, I talk about 1 percent changes a lot with everything. Because Often, when we set ourselves a goal, either to be more confident, to have more integrity, to sell more, to get more people on our email list, and we say, okay, we're at zero today and I want to be at a hundred tomorrow. Sometimes that is really hard to get. And sometimes that isn't always down to us. Sometimes, you know, that's not always something that we can control, especially when it's a goal or something like that. But what we can control is the 1 percent shifts. And often what happens is. If we set ourself a massive task, so let's say, and this is always such a really good, easy example, but it is a bit flippant, but the whole diet thing is such a great example because it's like day zero, you're terrible. And you're eating the worst of the worst and your diet's dreadful. And you say, tomorrow, I'm going to be perfect. And tomorrow you try and be perfect. and it's impossible, and your jump from zero to a hundred, and therefore you don't do it, and therefore you beat yourself up and think, well, I can't do it, and I'm rubbish, and I'm awful. Which sets you back even further than you've started already. So, it almost takes you to like minus ten, and then the next time you try and do it, you might, you know, Push yourself back even further. I hope all this is making sense. So taking 1 percent shifts is a really good way to strengthen any muscle. So if you want to become more confident about doing something, if you want to speak on a big stage, a 1 percent shift might be to See if you can do a training with a few of your friends or a 1 percent shift might be doing that 60 seconds at a networking event and doing it until you feel good and not like you're going to vomit on the table. The 1 percent shifts are easy because they're smaller things for you to do. And what happens is when you set that 1 percent and you do it. Your brain goes, look at that, we did it. We're ace. It doesn't matter that it was only 1%. It's just cheering the fact of, well done, you did it. It doesn't know really the difference, and I'm just making this bit up. I don't have any science to prove it, but it doesn't really know the difference between like this massive goal and the little goal. You either achieve it or you don't. So if you don't achieve it, you end up sometimes beating yourself up. And if you do achieve it, high five yourself. So those 1 percent shifts are really, really important. And that brings me to two other things that are attached to that. So the first thing is, you need to practice self compassion. So this is kind of like, if that was, you know, tip one, this is tip 1.A. Okay. So you need to practice that self compassion because What happens is, like I said, when you try and do something and you don't do it, or it doesn't happen the way you want it to happen, you can beat yourself up. And I've said before on the podcast many times about being the scientist, not the judge. So often when we try and do something and we fall on our face, because we will lots of times, and if we're not doing it, we're probably not trying hard enough, then If you do that and you fall on your face and it doesn't work and the judge comes out and goes, well I knew it wouldn't work because you are rubbish and no one wants to buy your thing because you're terrible and it's not going to happen and that dream of you having XYZ is just merely dream and it's never going to come to fruition and you're going to embarrass yourself and it's going to be terrible. Our brain is so very cruel. So when we let the judge kick in and say those things to us, what does that do for our confidence and our self confidence? literally puts it on the floor. When we practice self compassion, when we practice being kind to ourselves, which honestly, again, there are certain themes that run through everything mindset that I talk about, self integrity and self compassion are so important. But when we practice that self compassion and we become a scientist and not the judge, so the scientist would go, Okay, that was interesting. And sometimes I say, in fact, I was talking to Louise, who helps me stay accountable. And she basically keeps me on track and make sure I get to get all my work done. She, I was talking to her and I was saying something, I was like, Hmm, that's interesting. And she's like, I know you don't feel what you're saying. And I'm like, no, I don't always, sometimes I do feel like, Oh, that's so annoying. However, turning the, that's so frustrating, so annoying into that's interesting, really helps because then you start questioning and going, okay, well, that was interesting that that happened. Why might that be? And then you can have some self compassion for yourself. Okay. Well, you've never done that thing before. That was the first time. So who says you were going to be perfect at it? And actually. Yeah. You know, maybe it wasn't the right time or...