Overcome shyness and nerves
A series of articles on improving self confidence in social situations
Mark Twain said “It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt.”
This doesn’t help anyone lacking in self-confidence and whose mouth goes dry when attempting to make even the most basic conversation in social situations. If you are one of these people, you are certainly not on your own. It’s a common feeling that ‘everyone else appears so confident and self-assured’ that we frequently feel we are the only one in the world who is too shyly tongue-tied to join in.
Contemporary research in psychology doesn’t really help either. According to behavioral geneticist Corina Greven of King’s College, London and her colleague Robert Plomin of the Institute of Psychiatry, self-confidence is more than a state of mind and is, it seems, a matter of genetic predisposition. Their research, published in the June, 2009 issue of Psychological Science, is a rigorous analysis of the heritability of self-confidence and its relationship to IQ and performance.
Greven and Plomin found that children with a greater belief in their own abilities often performed better at school, even if they were actually less intelligent. They also concluded that the same held true for athletes, with ability playing a lesser role than confidence. I’m sure this will ring true for many of us who can easily think of people who forged ahead more successfully in life than their more intelligent and perhaps more academic peers.
If Greven and Plomin are right, it would seem that coaches, psychologists, trainers and parenting experts, who have traditionally argued that nurture has more influence on developing self-confidence than nature, have been barking up the wrong tree for years. However, the fact that a great chunk of self-confidence may be inherited does not mean that it is set in stone or that those lacking the genetic advantage of innate confidence cannot do anything to improve their situations.
A series of articles on improving self confidence in social situations
‘Each to each a looking-glass/Reflects the other that doth pass.’ (Cooley, 1902)
Even if you are not born with it, it is possible to learn how to be more confident. Self-confidence all boils down to how we feel about ourselves and this, for the most part, is a reflection of how we are raised, how people interact with us and our emotional reactions to life experience.
I use the word ‘reflection’ precisely because it is the basis of ‘The looking-glass’ theory, a concept of self in social psychological theory developed by Cooley (1902). The theory states that an individual’s concept of self develops from interpersonal interactions and from the perceptions of others. Essentially the theory states that we tend to base our self-perception on the perceptions that others have of us which leads us to reinforce society’s perception of ourselves. In other words, we shape ourselves after the perception of others and in turn confirm this perception and this leads to the expectancy effect. We tend to behave in ways that other people’s perceptions have led us to, creating a circle of behavior, reflection, reinforcement, expectation and repeated behavior. In a sense our behavior is conditioned by the way we think and believe others see us, not by how we actually perceive ourselves. And herein lies a solution – to stop for a moment, take stock of what we expect of ourselves and what we are actually capable of doing instead of believing only what others have led us to believe we are capable of doing.
1. Work on your conversational skills: Have something interesting to say … and talk about something you are interested in. Improving your conversational skills can help you feel more comfortable and confident in any social situation which will lead to larger confidence overall. If you practice maintaining eye contact and being a good listener, you will also give off a more confident aura and you can enjoy the benefits of being treated as a confident person.
2. Set goals: As with anything you want to achieve, building confidence will be easier if you set specific goals. Whether you want to be confident enough to be president of an organization or simply give a presentation at the next department meeting, you can then create an action plan for achieving this goal.
3. Take small steps: Going along with the idea of setting goals, if you’re not feeling confident, you will be much more likely to achieve your desired level of confidence by taking small steps. Tell yourself that you will smile and shake hands with everyone you meet today or promise that you will offer your opinion on an issue at the next board meeting. This is much more likely to lead to success and start you on the path to confidence than jumping straight to a more daunting task like giving the keynote speech at a national conference.
4. Use positive imagery and self-talk: The road to self-confidence is primarily a mental exercise. Visualizing yourself as a confident person is one way to create a confident mentality. Positive affirmations are another way of building confidence. Tell yourself that you are a confident person and don’t give negative thoughts room to grow. Cognitive rehearsal … watch a mental movie of yourself. So, before something nerve-wracking, run through a positive internal ‘home movie’ of yourself. If you’re going for a job interview, imagine just how well you’ll do and tell yourself you’re going to succeed. Even if you don’t get the job, you’ll naturally do better than if you had imagined the worst. When doing something for the first time, imagine that you have already done it. Close your eyes, then, vividly imagine you succeeding at what you are planning to do for the first time. The mind does NOT know the difference between something VIVIDLY imagined and something real. Make it vivid by involving all 5 senses.
5. Practice a confident attitude and relax: You may have heard this sentiment expressed as, “fake it ’til you make it.” The truth is that you can gain confidence by acting like a confident person. Nobody needs to know that you’re cringing underneath your confident facade. Eventually you’ll no longer need to pretend. The success you experience from acting confident and the confident habits you’ve developed will lead to true confidence. Act As If: Yes you feel nervous but you can PRETEND you are not … this will eventually lead to the reality that you are not at all nervous. Be more tense. Yes, the more tense you can make yourself the more relaxed you will be. Scrunch and relax. Scrunch TIGHTLY and LET GO … relax. Breathe. Anxiety and fear results in rapid, shallow breathing which makes you feel nervous. Don’t be controlled by nervousness, take control of your breathing
6. Look for confident role models: Whether you turn to co-workers, friends, family members or celebrities for inspiration, finding confident role models can help you become more confident yourself. It’s best if the person if you have real-life contact with the person you’re looking to emulate, but you can still get an idea of a celebrity’s personality and confidence-building strategies through interviews and books.
7. Try new things: New experiences can give you confidence by helping you grow as a person. You don’t have to take up skydiving or anything drastic like that. Starting a new hobby or taking a class is more likely to help you develop lasting skills anyway.
8. Be happy with yourself: BELIEVE in yourself – if you don’t believe in yourself, no one else will. Having an essentially positive attitude toward yourself is key to gaining confidence. You must be happy with the person you are, from your personality to your appearance, before you can truly be confident.