Words that give you confidence

One of the things that affects our confidence level, or any other feeling for that matter, is our language, or how we speak to ourselves and others about our experience.

Try this.

If I say to you, “This building confidence thing, or this sorting out your relationship, career or business, is going to be a problem,” how do you feel?

How does that feeling change if I say, “This building confidence thing, or this sorting out your relationship, career or business, is going to be a challenge”?

And what about if I say, “This building confidence thing, or this sorting out your relationship or career, is going to be an adventure”? How do you feel now?

I’ve found that most people feel more positive about tackling issues when they call them a challenge or an adventure.

The word “challenge” can make people feel like they are willing to roll up their sleeves and overcome a problem. However, some people feel cynical about the word, seeing it as a politically correct way of describing a problem.

“Adventure” often conjures up fun, the thrill of not knowing what’s around the corner, exploration and, often, nice surprises. When we feel a lack of confidence, we want certainty that things will turn out well and that we won’t make a mistake. By tapping into our love of adventure, it can become easier to make curiosity and discovery more important than our need for certainty.

However, a significant number of people feel more confident about “challenge” than “adventure”. Adventure, for some, suggests too much that is unknown and unpredictable.

So, basically, I’d encourage you to use whatever language helps you feel most resourceful, positive and confident when you are talking about a future task, project, experience, conversation or goal.

You also need to think about this when you are trying to lead, empower or parent others.

I remember a manager who proudly told me, “I was frank with my team. I said that we’ve just got to grind through the next three months.”

I smiled as he reflected and said, “OK, that probably wasn’t the most confidence-building and motivating thing I could have said to them.”

He was probably right.

But we do need to take into account our audience and remember the platinum rule: “Treat others as they would like to be treated.”

For instance, I remember watching a film called Sister Act. Whoopi Goldberg was playing a character tasked with empowering a group of nuns to sing melodiously as a choir. Whoopi’s character perceptively said to one nun, whose leadership position was being usurped, that she would need the nun’s help to work the choir hard.

As this nun was motivated by duty, hard work and difficulty, she was on board immediately and suddenly very resourceful, confident and enthusiastic.

What’s your next step to becoming more positive, confident and successful in your personal, business or career?