Building Unshakeable Confidence and Healthy Self-Esteem, you are a Goddess, so why are you not acting like one? Here's how!

What if you could transform your self-esteem and confidence, propelling you towards a life of fulfillment and success? Today on Find Your Inner Glow with Kirsty Harris, we unlock the secrets to building unshakeable confidence and a healthy self-esteem. This episode is packed with actionable insights on how understanding and nurturing these qualities can revolutionize your ability to handle rejection, manage anxiety, and set healthy boundaries in relationships. From the significance of positive self-talk and challenging negative thoughts to the profound effects of social media on our self-perception, Kirsty covers it all with wisdom and compassion.

Join me as I share personal stories, such as how solo travel has bolstered my self-love and confidence, and provide practical tips like maintaining a list of your achievements and stepping out of your comfort zone. We delve into the importance of seeking help from therapists or life coaches to navigate through life's challenges and foster personal growth. Whether you're looking to improve your decision-making skills or attract better quality relationships, this episode offers a comprehensive guide to nurturing your self-esteem and confidence. Embrace your inner glow and start living the life you've always deserved.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hello and welcome to the Find your Inner Glow podcast hosted by me, kirsty Harris. I am a holistic coach and I am super passionate about helping others improve their lives by focusing on the mind, body and soul. Each week, I will be sharing my insights, experiences and advice on how to tap into your inner glow and live a more fulfilling and balanced life. So join us and let's discover how to find your inner glow together. Hello, hello, hello, hello. Welcome back. Today we are going to be doing confidence 101, baby. We are going to be jumping into what confidence actually means, what self-esteem means, why it's important and, literally, ways that you can increase your confidence and self-esteem, which are super practical because, yeah, everyone should be living their most confident and most happy life. So, grab that cup of tea, let's get stuck in with why confidence is important. Okay, so when we have confidence, we are so much better, so much better. When we have confidence, we are so much better, so much better. We are much better at coping with rejection. We are able to just deal with the fact that something has happened that's out of our control and it's not a reflection of us or things that we have done. It also gives us the ability to cope better with anxiety, to cope better with fear. We're able to bounce back from setbacks a lot easier and they often aren't as painful as well. Confidence is rooted in your self-esteem and self-worth. So when you know that you are worthy of that job, that healthy relationship, etc. It means that we don't take rejection easily. We're just like cool, that's fine. You just do you, babe, like you want to reject me. You're not the right person for me. If you want to reject me, you're not the right job for me. Why? Because better things are coming. This is what I'm telling you. So, yeah, it's totally easy for you just to handle rejection. Take it on the chin and go yeah, okay, fair enough, that's just something out of my control and that's fine.

Speaker 1: 2:01

And also, if you have listened to any of my episodes, you will hear me bang on about how you need to love yourself, how you have to have confidence and belief. You are with those things, so they will also boost your manifestations. You know, when you know that you deserve something, you know that you're worthy of something, that really does boost your manifestation. And you living your dream life, like I, always, the only person getting in between you and your dream life is you, and I say it with love, I say it over and over until you actually get it. So, yeah, and also, being confident means that you can make better decisions.

Speaker 1: 2:36

When you are confident, you have a much better, strong and strong sense of self. Do you know what I mean? You know your mind, mind. You know what you want, so you're likely to make better decisions without self-doubt getting in the way. So you're going to say, yeah, babe, that's me, I want that, I want this. You're not deliberating back and forth. You know what you need and you know what's right for you. So that's really grounding to me. You know somebody who knows their mind as well is something that is super, super sexy. When you can really communicate what you want, that's really attractive and really sexy and that will obviously make you look super confident.

Speaker 1: 3:15

Also, if you are confident, you know the standard that you expect in your relationships, and that's not just from a romantic partner. It can be from family, from friends. You do not let people push your boundaries. You feel solid in your boundaries, without guilt. You know your worth and you know that you and your relationships are a work in progress, but you don't let them push those boundaries, you know exactly what makes you feel good and you stop letting people make you feel bad and in that, like, your vibe attracts your tribe, and I truly mean this. The people in our lives are mirrors. They are mirroring our trauma and things that we need to work on. So when you start holding yourself in a much higher standard of like I love myself, I like myself, I'm confident, you're able to attract better quality relationships. So, yeah, again, I'm just to carry on with this list of positives this in case you're not already sold. But taking positive risks is also in the list of what happens when you're confident.

Speaker 1: 4:14

So confident people are more likely to take positive risks. That is all about stepping outside your comfort zone. That is applying for that job where you're like I only meet 50% of the criteria, but I'm going to apply for it anyway. It's going up to a person in the bar and starting a conversation and being like hi, how are you? And just you know you don't have to ask for their number, but you just need to start the conversation and see where it goes. And you know these types of things could change your life. You know all of that time that you've spent like saying to yourself oh you know, but I don't meet a hundred percent of the job criteria. There is literally like research that shows that men are way more confident around jobs and will apply for jobs where they fit 50% of the criteria and they wing the rest, whilst women will look at meeting 80 or 90% of the criteria. So, those big ticket jobs that you want to apply for, or the things that you think are holding you back, just take the risk, as long as it's a positive risk, obviously, and you're not hurting yourself or anyone else.

Speaker 1: 5:12

But, yeah, taking positive risks is a really good side effect to being confident. And, of course, being confident it inspires others. Confident it inspires others and that can fill you with so much passion and so much like, oh, like. People can be really bloody lovely when they want to be. And, yeah, you can inspire others to be more confident, to take control of their lives. And basically, what I'm trying to jump like drum into you is that when you have unshakable confidence, you will succeed more in life. This is why the people at the top are at the top. It's because they're confident and they believe in themselves, and that's ultimately the bottom line. So, yeah, obviously, I'm just going to end the podcast here now, because I've told you everything, just jokes. I've got way more to tell you. So you know, keep sipping that cup of tea, we've got time.

Speaker 1: 5:59

So, when we think about confidence and self-esteem, they come in hand in hand. But, yeah, you genuinely have to know the difference between them, because they are two different things. They come hand in hand but they're very different. So confidence is what we portray outwards. This is what we give to our self. Outward world, this is how we present to others. So this is what happens when we show the world that we are trusting ourselves, that we believe in ourselves, we are outgoing and that we are resilient.

Speaker 1: 6:34

And if you look in the Cambridge dictionary definition, it's basically the quality of being certain of your abilities. That is confidence. And, to be honest, I don't fall out with that. I think that's pretty, pretty bang on, to be fair. So how is this different from self-esteem, you ask? Well, let me just tell you what it is.

Speaker 1: 6:54

Your self-esteem is inwards. So outwards confidence, inwards self-esteem. It's about how you view yourself on the inside, what you think about you. It's not about your skills or achievements. It's what you think about you. It's not about your skills or achievements.

Speaker 1: 7:05

It's generally what you think about yourself as a person, and self-esteem is often formed in childhood, or well, it's not. Often it is formed in childhood and if you come from a very loving and stable home with parents who supported you emotionally, you're likely to have good self-esteem. However, if you experience a lack of these, you have, you know, one of a different attachment types rather than secure attachment. If you are a victim of trauma, any sort of trauma and I'm talking about trauma, what is my definition, guys? The definition of trauma is when your brain is not able to just deal with something. It's overwhelmed overwhelmed which can be very different for so many people. So when you start having, like this, trauma as a child or you know, as experiences as you go up, it does dent our sense of self-esteem and our inner value and our worthiness.

Speaker 1: 7:57

Okay, so, despite if you grew up in a stable home or grew up in, like you know, in a lack environment, as you experience hurt, pain, your self-esteem can decrease. It can be impacted by the fundamental feelings of worthiness. Self-esteem is your core identity. Therefore, if you suffer from low self-esteem, I'm here to tell you that you can change this and you can do this through building your confidence, and when I think about confidence and self-esteem, I think about like a foundation, with solid self-esteem and confidence. This can be increased and maintained easily.

Speaker 1: 8:34

With fractured self-esteem it's still possible to be confident, but self-esteem is what we think of ourselves and confidence is how we portray to the outside world. So are we giving a genuine vibe? When we are walking in the room confident, we're probably going to come across as arrogant. We're going to come across as very full of ourselves because we're not giving that authenticity and genuine feeling that we believe in ourselves. We are, yeah, we are here and we truly believe in what we're saying. So you know there's an element of fake it till you make it. I don't fall out with that at all, but there does come a chance or a time where you need to believe in yourself so that the other people in the room can believe you as well. So now that we know that we're inwards with our self-esteem and what we think when we're outwards, we are believing in ourselves. We are worthy of good things. We are confident.

Speaker 1: 9:21

So it doesn't mean that you have to be like the loudest in the room. You are the most dominant person in the room. You just need to be the most self-assured, you need to know and understand and appreciate your talents, your strengths and abilities, and these two create a really solid foundation for your personality to grow, to push yourself out there and to push yourself out of your comfort zone. So I love a quote and I'm going to throw in this one from Michelle Obama, and it says your success will be determined by your own confidence and fortitude. So yeah, hello, it's all on you, babe. Your success is determined by you.

Speaker 1: 9:57

If this was like a topic and I was pulling a tarot card, it would be the chariot, where it's like you are in control, nobody else. You are in control, and that's really, really cool because you can take the direction that you want to take. You know, the success that you build is ultimately down to you and your confidence level, and I've said this for a long, long time before I even got into all of this stuff on a much deeper level, that confidence is the key to life. It absolutely is it. Yeah, yeah, confidence it's the key to life. That's a quote by me, kirsty Harris, just in case. Yeah, but moving on.

Speaker 1: 10:34

So what does confidence actually look like to you? So I've given you the very general definition, but maybe a nice general prompt would be what does confidence mean and look like for you? How do you envision yourself when you look confident? Because one that's manifesting two like that gives you a clear view of what confidence looks like for you, and that's super important. How do we know that we are not confident? Or we are confident when we don't know what we're measuring against? What gets measured gets improved. James Smith, literally I am a quoting machine today.

Speaker 1: 11:12

Guys, so confidence internally looks like you are talking positively to yourself, you challenge the negative self-talk, you have good feelings about who you are and you have a good sense of identity. This is what it looks like when you have a good foundation of self-esteem and confidence. Then, when we are talking about how that comes out in the world, it's about having effective communication. It's about being assertive, it's about having emotional control and being willing to take positive risks, like I explained earlier. So reflect on yourself, like how do you think about yourself? How do you talk to yourself?

Speaker 1: 11:43

It's really, really important to know how you talk to yourself and those negative thoughts when they start to come in, it's about trying to stop them in their tracks and challenge them with something else, like when I get a negative thought, which I don't get loads of now. I used to be plagued by negative thoughts so much and I think this was in a period of time where I just was really struggling and it's been like that for years. I don't really get negative self-talk now because I feel quite solid in who I am and I know who I am and what I want, and I know I sound like I'm boasting, but I'm just saying I've made that, I've made the effort to do the work. So doing the work, you do get the results which ultimately do change your life. And yeah, I don't know where I was going with that.

Speaker 1: 12:24

But what I'm trying to say is you need to work out for yourself, like how you need to speak to it feels and also the negative voices in your head. What are they saying? Who is saying it? Is it really you speaking to yourself, or is it previous people or assumptions from others that are plaguing your mind with those negative self-talk? Because how can you expect yourself to grow if you constantly beat yourself down? Let that deep for a minute. You want to grow, you want to manifest, you want this dream life, life but you constantly talk to yourself like you're nothing or you're not worth value. Um, there's a very big mix match there, and this is why I always try to draw the link between self-love and manifesting, because if you want that dream life, if you want to bring things into reality, you need to come from a place of happiness and joy and loving yourself. It's so, so important, but equally, it gives you so many other benefits of what I explained earlier.

Speaker 1: 13:20

So, as well, this is so important to touch on, and social media is just one of those things where I'm like I love it and I hate it. I love it because it keeps me connected. If I didn't have social media, I probably wouldn't be doing this podcast, I wouldn't have the groups I have, I wouldn't have met the people I have, because I've met so many wonderful people through social media. But equally, we are constantly told about beauty standards. We are subconsciously like, like just forced into this way of thinking that everyone has a really nice apartment and that everyone's house is very clean and minimal, and then they all have, like, perfect skin and their body is a certain way and their body is airbrushed and touched up and photoshopped into all different sort of shapes that make us feel bad, and then our bodies are all of a sudden a trend, and the list goes on and on, and you are consuming that daily through your phone, through instagram, through any social media network. You are consuming that daily. That's going to be in your subconscious, whether you want it to be or not, and if you're not in a good place with your confidence, what do you think that's going to do?

Speaker 1: 14:25

So my top advice for this is to follow people that inspire you. Follow a range of people like. So I never used to follow bodies on Instagram, where I would just be like. I would constantly compare myself. Comparison is a thief of joy. Theodore Roosevelt just saying and yeah, I would constantly compare myself to people online oh, they're on holiday, they're always on holiday, or they're this or they're that.

Speaker 1: 14:50

And I'm like Chris, it's a highlight reel. You're not gonna put on there that you're having a really rubbish day. It's a highlight reel. You're not gonna put on there that you're having a really rubbish day. Your partner's cheated on you and you I don't know you fell over and bumped your head. You're not gonna put all of that on Facebook. Because if you do, if you put that on social media, then you're just seen as this person who's an attention seeker. So then, that's why you only have to put the happy stuff on. But when you put the happy stuff on, it's unrealistic and doesn't reflect life of what it really is. So, yeah, deep that for a second, take that in, because, yeah, that's ultimately going to bash our confidence.

Speaker 1: 15:22

And sometimes as well, when we get negative comments online, when people go out of their way to be horrible people go out of their way to be horrible to me all the time. I'm like you clearly have not got time to be doing this and I just delete the comments, I block them and I just keep it moving. Why? Because they are not worth my time and I love me and I think I'm beautiful and I think what I'm doing is really, really helping people at the moment, and I know that from the feedback I'm getting from my clients, from people who approach me and say, wow, this has really helped me, this has really changed my life. This is, this is, yeah, those types of things are why I continue to do the things that I do, and that is external validation for me. But also, I really, truly believe in the work that I am doing so. That's why it's being so well received. You know what I mean.

Speaker 1: 16:07

So some other things that can affect our boundaries are comparing ourselves to others, which just went through, and excess time on social media, poor boundaries, ignoring your feelings, maintaining toxic relationships, staying stuck in the past. You know this is where you're experiencing shame, guilt. All of those things are ugly emotions that keep us stuck in the past. You're entertaining those friends who are energy vampires, who don't give you anything, but they take everything that you have. And, yeah, you ignore your feelings. So you start to just feel numb and then, when you can't control it anymore, it comes up and you feel like you're irrational and not able to control your emotions. These all bash our confidence. So you know what? Life is hard enough as it is. So why so? Why make it harder? Do you know what I mean? Just be nice to your bloody self. You know, if other people are not gonna be nice to you, then be nice to yourself, because at the end of the day, you are the only person that really matters in this life. You know it's good that we make connections and we have those relationships around us our friendships, our family but actually you are here to look after you.

Speaker 1: 17:15

You are not a child anymore, you are over 18. Well, you should be over 18. If you're listening to this, you're over 18. You should. You know you're an adult. You're designed to look after yourself. Now, babe, you need to look after yourself. That is coming home to you. That is that's really strong sense of self and understanding your strengths and what you bring to this world.

Speaker 1: 17:35

Because you bring so many beautiful things and, like I've said on this podcast before, like you bring unique things. You are a solely unique person. The way you experience the world is totally different to the next person, to the next person, to the next person. Nobody even has the same body shape as you, the exact same body shape. You have your own body shape. You are 100% unique and you need to realize that because that is your superpower.

Speaker 1: 18:00

Okay, being you is literally your superpower. So how do we nurture our superpower? Oh god, sorry, that was a motorbike. There we go right, building our confidence. We need to learn to accept compliments, not accept confidence. But you know we can accept that too. I am open to receive confidence. Hey, there we go. There's a nice affirmation for you Accept compliments, say thank you, don't go.

Speaker 1: 18:27

Oh yeah, oh no, this is something new. I just put this on. Stop it, shut up your mouth, babe. I love you, but shut up. Just accept the compliment, just go. Thank you, that's cool. Write it down. Say it to yourself later.

Speaker 1: 18:43

When I get a compliment, I say it to myself all day. Yeah, I'm this person. Why? Because it makes me feel good and actually when I say it to myself, I actually feel better than when that person says it to me and when people talk to me about how I am as a person, how I've contributed to their life as a person all of that stuff, rather than my physical beauty. That means so much more to me now than my physical appearance, which used to be the other way around before.

Speaker 1: 19:07

Also, there's this huge theme in life right now where I feel like there's so much forgiveness that we need to give to ourselves. Guess what? We all make mistakes. Yeah, you heard me. We all make mistakes. It's not a secret. It's not something that we need to be ashamed of. It's something that we need to forgive ourselves in order to move forward. You know what? I will make a mistake? Well, I've made mistakes on this podcast today. You've heard me. Am I going to beat myself up over it? Podcast today. You've heard me. Am I going to beat myself up over it? No, am I going to make bigger mistakes in my life? Absolutely, but they're all lessons and like something that's really comforting for me is like I have trust fallen into the universe time and time again and it's caught me. I've trust falled with myself and I have always caught me. I've always got me.

Speaker 1: 19:52

So, yeah, having that trusting myself has been massive in my confidence growth, knowing that I can handle myself. A big part of it was going on solo trips, like keeping myself safe massively increased my self-love, my confidence, my ability to keep myself safe, because I've had experiences in my life where I haven't always felt safe, even in relationships, most recently, like I've not always felt 100% safe, but I know I've got me and I trust me and I trust my decision making, I trust who I am, and that's really, really a strong way to build your confidence and you can do this little by little by doing little things that make you trust yourself. I always say, like solo travel, you don't have to leave the country, you could just go to a hotel for a night and just start pushing yourself out of your comfort zone, because you will not grow in your comfort zone. You're at the level you are now and if you want to get better, if you want to have better confidence and self-love, then you need to take that level up. Babe, you need to grow out of your comfort zone. Those people who go, oh do you fancy doing this? You just say yes and you go for it.

Speaker 1: 20:54

So another thing that you can do to increase your confidence is to reflect on the positives. This is about looking at your. You know your qualifications, your achievements, no matter how big or small. I keep a list of achievements on my phone like and it's called like. The list is actually called um, how I know I'm on the right path. So anything good, any sort of feedback I get. Anything I get that's really good and positive. I literally put in there and I'm like, yeah, do you know? This is cool, I love this. So, yeah, keep a list of achievements, appreciate the good qualities you do possess, write a, put it down. I want to see it somewhere. I want you to reflect on it and add to it like more and more. I know it's difficult when maybe we're not in a place where we're feeling really painful and like confidence and self-esteem is really hard for us. Write down things that are good about you and if you can think about that rink, about the rink, think about the things that people have said to you. It's yeah, it's really important to note those things down, because that's what other people see in you, but also that's the stuff that you need to see in yourself as well.

Speaker 1: 22:06

Obviously, I'm going to say ask for help if you need it. Obviously, what I'm going to say is that I'm not a doctor. I just talk about mindset and my experience from my perspective. So if you do need help, ask for it. There's no shame in asking for help around this as a topic, especially if you've been through trauma. It's really really hard and yeah. So what I would say is ask for help, go see a life coach, go see a therapist, go see a counsellor, go see your GP, go do whatever you need to do. If you feel like you need to have assistance around this, okay. And what I would say is watch your social media, follow the people who make you feel good. Okay, because just avoid social media on days where you're not feeling that great. Okay.

Speaker 1: 22:50

Also a way to build your confidence and self-esteem is gratitude. Be grateful for what you already have in your life and you will attract more, okay. Okay, and now I'm going to do something a little bit different on the pod, which I've not done before, but basically I'm going to say affirmations and then I'm going to allow you some time to say them after me. That's just what I'm going to do. So humor me, say them with me out loud in your head, whatever you want to say it. And yeah, let's start with our first one. So the first one is I am confident and value myself. I deserve to feel good about myself. I am strong enough to overcome any challenge. I am beautiful inside and out. And my last one and my favorite one I love me. So why are we doing affirmations, guys? Because if you listened earlier, you'd know that this is the quickest way to rewire your brain. Okay, this is the way that you are going to up your confidence by telling yourself the things that you need to hear. Okay, so this was quite like a powerful episode for me.

Speaker 1: 24:14

I've always wanted to talk about this. I always talk about confidence and self-esteem with people and I'm always pushing people out of their comfort zone whenever I get a chance, me and my little stick poking people out of their comfort zone, because I just think, like being your authentic self is the most beautiful thing that you can be in the world. You don't have to be like the kim kardashians or what everyone expects you to be like. You can just be you, and finding out who you are and what you like is just such a magical experience and it's such a good process of self-discovery. And it doesn't matter how old you are. You can be as old or as young as you like, or as young as the person you're feeling, obviously with consent. With consent, um yeah. And over the age of 16 um yeah. I gotta stop saying like this spicy stuff on there on the pod.

Speaker 1: 25:00

Anyway, the key takeaways are confidence is key to life. Make sure that you focus on it, that you've put some investment into yourself to increase your confidence, explore your confidence and self-esteem. This could pretty much come up in any shadow work as well. If you're in the spiritual world, you'll investment into yourself to increase your confidence, explore your confidence and self-esteem. This could pretty much come up in any shadow work as well. If you're in the spiritual world, you'll know about shadow work. Shadow work is looking at that part of ourselves where we don't really look. It's those negative aspects of us, it's our limiting beliefs. It's the things that really, really hold us back. And if you're interested in limiting beliefs, check out my last bonus episode about inner size versus exercise, because the end pretty much just focuses on limiting beliefs and what they are, and you can achieve the life that you want, my babe. You just have to believe in yourself. And it's not about waiting for others. If you wait for others, you'll wait forever. You need to believe in you.

Speaker 1: 25:51

So I'm gonna stop talking now, because I've literally talked for ages about this. I get very excited talking about confidence. As you can tell, I've been quite powerful in my voice today, being like, yes, confidence. So yeah, thank you very, very much for listening. I hope that you've taken something away today with this. Hopefully, you have. Let me know what you think. Leave me a review, preferably five stars, but if it's not, tell me why. I want to know. And yeah, you can find us on instagram, tiktok, facebook, all the socials. And yeah, come back next monday. We've got another episode, very exciting, also exciting. And yeah, I hope you have the most wonderful day and thanks so much.