Are you standing tall? The secret to self confidence

By guest blogger Alex Petty.. Great coach, Mentor and good friend.

For more than 30 years, Alex has built his work and people skills in Corporate and SME businesses. For the last 7 years Alex has been working with business owners and their teams, helping them realise the potential in themselves and their business through coaching and mentoring.

Are you standing TALL!

By that I mean, do you portray a confident image to the world.

Did you know that others can read you like a book, even without training. I’m sure you can already pick up on others’ moods or feelings. So if you were to learn more about reading people, how much more you could pick up. How much easier would life be, and how much better would you be a communicating? There are many good books on how to portray yourself well, but let’s look a little deeper than seeing it as an act.

Some actors are very good at playing a tough guy or a subordinate softy, when behind the scenes they are not that person at all.

, Are you standing tall? The secret to self confidenceLet’s look at Beyoncé. She comes across on stage as a highly confident artist. Yet, behind the glitzy show, she used to be quite shy. Beyoncé overcame her shyness by taking on an alter ego and becoming Sasha Fierce. It’s Sasha who used to perform all those provocative and raunchy moves.

Since 2010, Beyoncé ditched Sasha to become the powerful entertainer, wife and mother she is today.

What tools could you use to become the person you want to be?

It’s not often something that you can change overnight. See, it’s easy to act the part for a while, but you need to really become the person you want to be.

One tool is IVVM – Idealisation, Visualisation, Verbalisation & Materialisation. Write down the 10 traits you are (intend to be) and say them out loud to yourself every morning as you get up and every night as you go to bed. Your mind will soon latch on to the belief that this is who you are rather than the old you.

You need to make the statements strong, emotional and as specific as possible; you need to keep going with them for as long as it takes for you to look at your list and realise that the statements are you.

, Are you standing tall? The secret to self confidenceFor example: ‘I am a winner’ is good; even better is, ‘I won a gold medal at the Olympics’; Better still is, ‘I won the gold medal for Skeleton bob at the Sochi Winter Olympics in 2014’… This is what Lizze Yarnold believed for over 4 years before actually receiving her medal.

It was fascinating listening to the competitors being interviewed at the start of the Winter Olympics. Some were just glad to get to the games, others had expectations of getting a top 10. Some competitors thought they should get a medal and some that they had come to win the gold. The results speak for themselves.

But don’t mistake confidence for arrogance, confidence is based on the understanding that you are fully prepared. This includes how you portray yourself. It is useful to learn what your body language says about you. Many ‘tells’ show whether you are confident, truthful, powerful, friendly, paying attention….

One book I recommend to gain a better understanding of reading yourself and others is What Every Body Is Saying: An Ex-FBI Agent’s Guide To Speed Reading People – Joe Navarro.

So, how do you choose to portray yourself to the world?

Many thanks to Alex for a great post and certainly food for thought. You can find out more about Alex’s great work here. As always, your comments, thoughts and feedback are most welcome. If you would like to guest blog, please drop me a line I would love to hear from you.

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