This week on the pod, I chatted with Tam Kaur — a true goddess who’s spreading content online to help women become more CONFIDENT. I think confidence is something that a lot of us have either struggled with, or are constantly trying to tap more into, and Tam provides tangible that actually help.
So: let’s debrief some of this week’s biggest takeaways from the episode!
WHAT EVEN IS CONFIDENCE?
According to Tam, “confidence is being so sure of yourself and building such a strong foundation of who you are that nothing anybody else says could shake that… and any loss of an achievement or a label doesn’t affect it. It’s within yourself and how you perceive yourself.”
WHY IS CONFIDENCE IMPORTANT?
Strengthening confidence is key so that we can move beyond feelings of self doubt and be able to achieve the things we long for in our life.
If we’re consumed by fear and if we’re constantly feeling self conscious or “less than”, it's much harder to make the leaps we want.
Something Tam & I dove into in the episode is the difference between appearing more confident and actually feeling + embodying confidence. Both are important — once we understand the difference,
then we can dive into the practical tools to implement both into our life.
BEING confident vs. APPEARING confident: What’s the difference?
It’s quite easy to master appearing more confident — working on your body language, making eye contact speaking to people, or walking into a room like you own it are some examples.
While these are are all powerful techniques that can help you become a bit more confident, at the end of the day, if you don’t do the inner work and don’t work on your self worth/ self perception, if something goes wrong in your life or you need to take a big step in your life, those techniques for APPEARING more confident won’t actually help you.
Embodying confidence is about reversing the self doubt you’ve built over the years and working on your sense of self worth.
Okay so this all makes sense, right? Maybe you’ve tried some tricks to appear more confident but deep inside you are still being hard on yourself, judging yourself or feeling judged by others.
How do you actually start reversing your self doubt?
Step outside your comfort zone: Once you’ve succeeded at even one thing that you were scared to do, you start building a record in your brain of just how powerful you are. Every new time you are in an unfamiliar situation where you feel uncomfortable, and you push through, realizing you survived it and even thrived in it, you strengthen your feelings of confidence.
Try something new: Change things up — get a new haircut, try new ways of dressing/switch up your wardrobe — when you begin to dress the way YOU want to, you start to embody what makes you feel in your power.
Affirm it to yourself & fake it until you make it: Begin an affirmation practice — it might feel very uncomfortable at first (and no, you’re not being fake if you fake it ‘till you make it). The more you practice affirmations, the more you start embodying the qualities of your dream self until they become a natural part of you and your personality.
Stop asking other people for their opinions and their validation: If you want to post a picture on your Instagram, post it - don’t send it in your group chat and ask for others’ reassurance. If you want buy a piece of clothing, don’t ask someone else if it looks good or if you should get it. Your opinion is the only relevant one because you’re one person in this planet who knows yourself inside and out. Once you start listening to your own opinion, you build trust with yourself and become more confident in the process.
Keep promises you make to yourself: As Ed Mylett says, “Confident people are confident because they’ve kept their promises and they have a positive reputation in their own minds…And remember: It’s not enough just to keep your promises to yourself; You have to give yourself the credit you deserve. Each time you follow through on a promise and reach a goal, make sure you take a moment to say, ‘Hey, I did that. I worked hard, and I deserve the credit for it.’”
PS: Feeling and becoming confident doesn’t necessarily happen overnight. Just like you practice a sport or meditation, you need to practice confidence too. The more you do it and strengthen the confidence muscle, the more natural it will feel over time.
While doing the inner work and becoming more confident is ultimately the most game-changing practice you can do, there are also some tips + tricks you can use to appear more confident.
Here are 2 tips Tam shared for appearing more confident:
1. Every day when you wake up, think of your dream self or a confident person in general and ask yourselHow would they go about their day from this point? How is their body language? How do they speak? How do they carry themselves? What would a confident person choose to wear today? You have to carry those daily habits into your daily life.
2. Start dressing for yourself, not necessarily what’s “appropriate” for the occasion:
"If you’re going to the movies in a dress and heels, who’s stopping you? Wear the colorful eyeshadow or the craziest hairstyle if it makes you feel beautiful. Let go of trying to follow trends, or what society deems is the prettiest thing to do (whether what’s trending is wearing less makeup, or doing the Y2K trends or dressing minimalistic). Follow YOUR style and honor your preferences to build trust with yourself. When you do this, strutting into a room feeling confident will just radiate from you and everyone will sense that.
glow up tips
Lastly, we chatted with Tam about ‘GLOWING UP’ and what that even means to her. Here are some of Tam’s tips for glowing up:
What does glowing up MEAN? Glowing up is about getting as close to the dream version of yourself as you can and achieving your goals.
You get your desires for a reason, the things you choose to put on your vision board are for a reason - and now it’s your time to honor that work towards it.
Start by writing a list of goals - What actually matters to YOU? Is it being as healthy as possible, getting your dream body, always looking your best, progressing in work, making friends with new people…?
Get clear on the feeling you’re chasing behind your goals - As Tam shared in the episode: “Going to the gym for me isn’t about achieving a certain physical aesthetic, it’s a way to hack happy hormones and do something nice to my body while feeling accomplished. That in itself is doing something internal and external - it’s improving my mood and helping me feel my best, while also glowing up externally “
See your glow up as a time to shed the old version of yourself and step into a new version of you - Everyone has weaknesses or things that they want to work on. Whatever you feel that might be holding you back or that you’re not proud of … your glow up is a time to improve on and practice that skill every day.
If it’s confidence, start going on solo dates, going to events, hanging out with friends of friends, or offering to hosting people. If it’s feeling better in your own skin, start going out with no makeup or try a new fashion aesthetic. It starts with that list of goals.
Use affirmations in present tense to actually manifest your glow up - In your notes app on your phone, write in first person how your best self shows up: for example, writing “I go to the gym every day” is way more powerful than “I want to start going to the gym every day”. When you see yourself in the affirmation that way, you consciously begin to think of what you really want and it helps you identify with that decision or habit.
So what do you say? Are you ready to step into your most powerful and confident self? If so, listen to the full episode here!
Hope this helps you, and until next week, remember to pour in yourself & show up for your mind + body + soul with love :)
xoxo,
Carolina
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