Confidence Building Exercises

One way to start being confident is to start imagining how you would feel if you WERE confident. Remember a time when you felt at your most confident, close your eyes and try to bring back the sensations of your feelings at that time. Try to remember where that feeling is coming from - is it your head? Your stomach? Your hands? Imagine your confidence spreading from this spot and rushing around the rest of your body, completely filling you up from your toes to the top of your head. Imagine your heart pumping it around your body so that it flows through every cell of your body. Count upwards from 1 to 10, allowing the feeling to increase with each number.

As your confidence reaches its peak and your body feels that it is overflowing with confident feelings, use a physical gesture to allow you to fix how you feel so that you can re-create it whenever necessary. Pinch the back of your hand, stamp your foot, clap your hands - anything that you can perform easily whenever you need a confidence boost.

Repeat this exercise several times, so that you really become aware and attuned to the feelings that come with confidence. Each time your confidence reaches its maximum, carry out your physical gesture. Then, in future, whenever you need some extra confidence, simply pinch the back of your hand (or whatever action you chose) to trigger off that feeling of confidence.