How do I build my self-confidence and worth?

Many women struggle with building their self-worth and increasing their confidence. Although we can all have times when we lack confidence and need a boost for some women, the prolonged effects of low self-esteem and low confidence can be harmful to their mental health.

What is self-worth?

Self-worth, is one of those buzzwords that we hear so often now, but what exactly does it mean? There seem to be so many “self” words, from self-worth, self-confidence, self-esteem, and self-care, that it is hard to distinguish one from another.

Self-worth comes from within, it is an internal sense of being that is achieved by acquiring self-love, self-acceptance, and self-understanding.

Self-worth can not be gained from external factors, unlike self-esteem which is linked to what other people think of us or validation from external forces. Self-worth is generated solely by how we feel and what we think about ourselves.

The more self-worth and higher self-esteem you have the greater your self-confidence will be and the more you’ll feel able to take on in your life.

Try asking yourself a few quick questions to see where your self-worth stands at this moment in time:

1. What words would you use to describe yourself?

2. What words would you use to describe how other people view you?

3. Do you use mainly positive, neutral, or negative descriptions about yourself?

4. On a scale of 1-10, how highly would you say you value yourself?

Answering these quick questions can give you valuable insight into your state of self-worth.

• What Determines Self-worth

Our self-worth is commonly determined by our own self-evaluated abilities in areas that we deem to be important or of value to us.

They can vary widely from individual to individual. There is a more common list of factors that people will use to measure their self-worth;

• Appearance- your weight, hair colour, style of dress, your looks, how you feel others see you

• Career- What you do for work

• Personal achievements - Education, qualifications, career achievements,

• Personal assets - Where you live, what car you drive, where you holiday, financial assets

• Who you know- size of your social media network, who your friends are, people you know, level of influence you have.

What Doesn’t Determine Self-worth from Other People

Self-worth is how you think about and regard yourself, not what other people think. Things that do not determine your self-worth from other people are;

• Your job/career- What you do for a living has no bearing on your self-worth.

• Your finances - How much money you do or don’t have

• Your social circle- The friends that you have or the social choices that you make

• Your education - What qualifications you have, where you went to school, and what you studied

• Your likes and dislikes - Your sense of taste is unique to you, there is no right or wrong, good or bad, and everyone has their own.

How to Build Self-worth

Self-worth is all about believing in yourself and feeling great about who you are regardless of other people’s opinions. It is at the core of our being, how we think, behave and feel is all tied to our concepts of self-worth. Knowing what it is, is one thing, but many find having and doing it are difficult concepts to grasp.

If children learn from a young age the concept of self-worth, they will grow up to believe in and value themselves. As adults, it can be a little trickier though not impossible. Following the points below can change the way that you see yourself and increase your self-worth and boost your confidence.

1. Start by fully understanding who you are and what your values are

   Many people are unaware of who they are on an emotional level and try and fit into other people’s opinions of themselves.

   Fully understanding who you are and what you stand for will give you a greater sense of your self-worth. When you are fully comfortable in your own opinions and thoughts and do not look for validation from other people your self-worth will grow.

   Your true values and beliefs will be an indicator of how you see yourself and feel about yourself. If you have values and ideas that you fully believe in and live by then this will reflect on your self-worth.

2. Accept the person you are, flaws and all

   Once you have fully accepted the person you are your self-worth will automatically increase.

   Accepting that your body may never be the perfect shape that you want it to be, you may never look like someone you want to look like, you may never learn another language.

   Whatever it may be that you see as being a flaw in yourself, learn to accept it and love and be happy with who you are.

3. Develop some self-love

   Many people are full of unconditional love for others and yet constantly give themselves a hard time, knocking themselves and putting themselves down over every mistake that they believe that they make. Learning to develop self-love is a crucial part of building self-worth.

   You need to accept that you have flaws, will make mistakes, and will never be perfect, and yet still see that you are worthy of love compassion, and understanding. Begin by talking to yourself positively and compassionately.

4. Challenge your inner critic

Often we are the best people at putting ourselves down. How often do you find yourself saying, “ I can’t do that”, “ I will never succeed”, or “ I am not pretty enough”?

Even when other people may try to convince us otherwise, our inner critic can be so loud and destructive that we constantly listen to her and believe what she says.

To develop self-worth, you have to start ignoring the inner critic in your head and close her down when she begins to talk. Challenge what she says against what other people have said. Don’t give her space to control how you feel about yourself.

5. Develop a new skill

Developing new skills is a surefire way to build self-worth and increase confidence. When you feel capable of doing something you are always going to feel better about yourself. Whether it is a skill for personal use or something that is going to aid you in your employment, you will get a real boost of confidence when your level of competency increases.

6. Don’t feel the need to people, please

Many people can suffer from low self-worth and decreased confidence because of their need to constantly please other people. This behaviour means that they lack confidence in their judgement and opinions because they are always doing what they feel other people want them to do, therefore they don’t develop their personalities as much.

If you recognise yourself here then you need to stop people-pleasing and start following your path.

Be brave in the decisions and opinions that you have, you will discover your confidence increasing and your self-worth rising.

7. Speak positive affirmations daily

If you are someone who finds it difficult when it comes to saying good things about yourself, then you need to try writing out a list of positive affirmations about yourself and reciting them morning and evening.

Positive affirmations are a very powerful way of changing the negative thoughts that you have about yourself and replacing them with positive ones.

Make a list of twenty positive thoughts such as, “ I am compassionate”, and “ I am valued” and repeat them to yourself every day.

Soon this will change your mindset concerning yourself and will encourage self-love to flourish which will bring about greater feelings of self-worth.

8. Set clear goals for yourself and keep focused on accomplishing them

Setting goals for yourself will give you purpose and a direction to be going. When you have accomplished the goals that you have set, you will automatically feel better about yourself, which will boost your self-worth and confidence, a win-win situation to be in.

9. Employ a confidence coach

If you find that you are struggling on your own, why not hire a coach to help you? They can give you tips and tools to aid in your development and can be a strong presence in keeping you focused.

A coach will always have your best interests at heart so will be working for you to achieve the results that you want. They can also give you accountability and spur you on to keep going and improving.

10. Address your self-limiting beliefs

We can all have self-limiting beliefs, even the most confident and accomplished person can be plagued by thoughts that can wreak havoc on the way they feel about themselves. Most people have self-limiting beliefs that they have been carrying around since childhood. These serve no one and need to be eradicated.

This won’t happen overnight, as for many people these thoughts have been there for a long time and the brain is used to believing them.

With time and the right training though, they can be overcome and more helpful and constructive thoughts can be put in place.

11. Clearly define your purpose in life

A well-defined life purpose will give your confidence a real boost and will help to build your self-esteem.

Your life purpose doesn’t have to be the job that you do, it could be your morals and values that lead you to live in a certain way or it could be voluntary work that you undertake.

A purpose in life will give you something to get up for and a direction for your life to be going it.

12. Journal every day

As a coach, I often use journaling as a tool with my clients because I understand how effective it can be in challenging negative beliefs and supplanting new positive thoughts. Writing down the way that you feel about yourself and the thoughts that you have can put your thinking into perspective.

Journaling can help you to understand any triggers or past events that have led you to think the way that you do and can help you boost your self-worth and increase levels of confidence.

13. Celebrate your achievements large and small

Make sure when you have accomplished something whether large or small that you congratulate yourself. Any achievement that you make in life is worth celebrating and should always be recognised.

Celebrating your achievements will demonstrate to yourself how much you can do and will push you to do more, thus building your self-confidence and self-worth.

14. Listen to self-hypnosis recordings

Self-hypnosis recordings are powerful aids in helping you to change the perception you have of yourself. They can be easily downloaded and listened to when you have some quiet time to yourself.

The more you listen to them, the more they will become underlying beliefs that will help you to change the perception that you have of yourself.

These tools are of great benefit when you are trying to build confidence and self-esteem.

15. Go to places on your own

Do you ever feel awkward or embarrassed going places on your own? Are you the sort of person who backs away from new experiences because you don’t have anyone to do something with? Moving out of your comfort zone and going places by yourself is an excellent way of building self-worth and increasing confidence.

Although it may seem difficult at first, you need to remember that other people are not thinking about you in the same way that you think about yourself. They won’t be judging you, most people will actually be congratulating you for having the courage to step up and do things by yourself.

16. Pay more attention to your appearance and clothes

How you look will often determine how you feel about yourself. Paying attention to the clothes that you are wearing and your overall appearance can help to boost confidence and improve your feeling of self-worth.

It should be noted here that this isn’t done for the benefit of others but purely for how you feel about yourself.

The opinions that someone else has about your appearance should never be taken into consideration, you should dress to please only yourself.

17. Develop love and respect for yourself

If someone were to ask you if you had love and respect for yourself what would your answer be? It’s amazing how many women would say that they don’t have love and respect for themselves, yet having these feelings towards yourself is a great way to build your self-worth and increase your confidence.

You need to appreciate yourself and have love and respect, despite any failings that you may perceive you have. Nobody is perfect, that is an absolute fact of life, you need to be able to acknowledge your flaws but not let them become an obstacle to your good qualities. Find love and respect for yourself and watch your confidence soar.

18. Don’t compare yourself to other people

You are you and it is never a helpful exercise to compare yourself to someone else.

Yes, it is good to have role models and people to look up to, but ultimately, you should never compare and judge yourself against another person. We all have our faults, you should never view another person as perfect.

19. Become more self-disciplined in your life

Having self-discipline is a great skill to acquire as it will mean that you are far more likely to achieve better results in your life, thus boosting your self-worth and confidence.

Setting goals and sticking to them, being principled and holding firm to your values will all enhance the positive thoughts that you have about yourself.

20. Focus on your good points

Everybody has good points, regardless of how they view themselves. Sit down and make a list of your good points, even if you find this a struggle to begin with, taking some time to do this exercise will be very rewarding.

Once you have put down a couple of points you will probably find your brain will throw up more and more, it’s a question of really thinking about yourself and how other people perceive you.

Focusing on your good points is a rewarding tool as it will help to increase your confidence and boost your self-worth when you acknowledge all of your positive traits.

21. Don’t be a perfectionist

You need to be realistic about who you are and what you can do. Being a constant perfectionist is tiring and destructive. Nobody should ever expect you to be perfect, so why would you expect this from yourself?

Ask yourself if you would judge another person the way you judge yourself. For many, the answer would be” no” so apply this thinking to yourself.

Of course, it is good to try your best and strive to do the best you can but trying to be perfect in everything you do will only ever lead to failure and disappointment and will eventually affect your confidence and self-worth.

Final Thoughts

You are not going to change how you feel about yourself overnight, and it would be totally unrealistic to even contemplate that.

This is a procedure that needs small, consistent steps to change your long-held beliefs about yourself.

Applying the above tips can be very beneficial in helping you to build your self-worth and increase your confidence.

If you still find it difficult to build self-worth, then there are other techniques that you can use. Working with a coach can help you to develop new ways of thinking and understanding yourself.

They can work with you on a 1-1 basis and offer you tools, tips and support to change your thinking about yourself.

If you would like to listen to the audio version of this blog post click below;

Comment and share if you have any tips on increasing confidence as a woman