Lacking confidence is holding you back at work

“ We’d love to see a bit more confidence from you”

Who’s ever heard that one? You do your job really well, your performance reviews are always good but you’re forever getting passed on for promotions.

People who  do not have the same skills as you are promoted because they are charming, their hand is in the pocket of management and they have the gift of the gab.

As try as you might to perform well at interviews, you find yourself nervous and even though you know all the right things to say, you just can’t seem to articulate it as well as you rehearsed in the car.

The well rehearsed, confident, albeit (at times) less suitable candidate trumps your performance and lands the job and you end up working for someone who couldn’t even do your job well. You end up being pressured to take on more of their role to compensate for their inability and you watch them take the credit for it.

It leaves you feeling deflated. You wonder if anyone will ever see through the shiny charisma of your (so called) new boss and realise that you’re doing their job for them; but they don’t. They don’t ever notice your work and admittedly you don’t really put yourself out there anymore.

You’re quiet in meetings. Even when you have something important to say, you keep your mouth shut in fear of the confrontation, judgement or consequences. So you just fade away, you keep your thoughts to yourself and become increasingly frustrated and jaded by the whole organisation.

You think it might be time for a new job but you know you could never put yourself out there again.

What would happen if you could turn that around? What kind of difference would it make if you were able to stand up for yourself, say your piece and get noticed?

The fear is holding you back and it’s not just at work either. Where else are you hiding? In your romantic life, relationships, health and well being and even friendships? Lack of confidence can be crippling and it is self fulfilling; when you think you’re not confident, you lose confidence.

This fear then drives your performance and tints your reality. Even when you’ve done a great job, you lack the belief to recognise it, allowing someone else to take most of the credit- yet again.

Take some action in your life. Read up on how to be more confident. Take a course in assertiveness, get a coach, watch a YouTube channel on it, anything! You can learn how to have your confidence match your true capability and finally get ahead at work.

Top tips for quick confidence:

1.       Before any important meeting or interview,  adjust your posture. Make sure your shoulders are back and your head it facing forward, not up or eyes to the ground; even and straight.
2. Use mantras to get you into state, use “All the confidence/certainty I need, is within me now.” If you have the space say it out loud then do so on repeat and really feel it; if not, do it in your head. Grow taller and stronger with each repetition
3.    Practice. In order to gain confidence you’re going to have to risk stuffing up. You’re either going to win or learn. So take a deep breath, build your certainty and give it a go.

Here’s to getting ahead at work!

Peace, Katie Nicole

For more tips and tricks on all things confidence,  follow More Confidence on social media @moreconfidence

For your free e-book, the "5 secrets to bulletproof confidence", email loveyourself@moreconfidence.com.au

Lost and living by other peoples rules

It was 2007 and I was sure that I had made it. I had been through 6 months of auditions, psych tests and hoops, I had signed the contracts and done all the promo videos all the while being advised that this did NOT mean that I would be successful.

But damn! I knew I was close. I was focusing all my attention on getting there and I wanted it more than I had ever wanted anything before. I wrote affirmations for hours a day until I filled an entire notebook and then some. I visualised it, meditated on it, made it my every waking thought!

There was a burning desire in me to prove everybody wrong, to prove myself wrong if I’m really being honest. I knew I was destined for great things, I could feel that little voice deep inside my heart that told me I was worthy but nothing I did could make me believe it.

I thought this might do it, if I could just get my face out there, then everyone would know my name and my path to success and fame would have begun. I would show the world, my haters and myself that I was worthy.

It was always like that, pleasing others. Proving my worth externally. Through sex, a loud personality, martyrdom or self-deprecation (to name a few), I buried my true feeling for the approval of others.

4 days out from Big Brothers opening show and I had to face the facts. I had not made it. If I had, I would already be in lockdown. I was gutted, I had put so much time and effort and all of my heart and soul into this and here I was, lost; again!

Again, I had to look at myself and realise that I wasn’t good enough. I watched the opening show and cried (truth: balled!). I had so much of my identity tied up in what others thought and it seemed that maybe they were right after all.

I was contractually obliged to stay in the country for the duration of the show as they could call me with 24 hours’ notice to enter the house as an intruder. I was stuck in my home town watching other people live out my dream.

In those three months I came to realise just how much emphasis I had put on what others thought of me. I had been playing life by other people’s rules, standards and expectation. I was the girl that everyone expected me to be. I had created a persona of a loud party animal, helper at any cost and I realised just how lost I had become. I had no idea who I was anymore.

I never did make it in as an intruder or housemate and out of the 27 people who went in that year; I was in the top 30. Close but no such cigar. So the journey to self-love truly began.

My contract had expired and I was free to leave the country, so I took myself to Europe; for 2 years. I left behind all the expectations, the versions of myself that I no longer knew or liked and set a course to find out who I was.

Things got much worse before they got any better but what I learnt in the coming 2 years and subsequently the following decade was how to set my own rules. I learnt how to create a life that I truly wanted to live in a way that meant that I was being true to myself.

I learnt tools, strategies and techniques that allow me now to be the truest version of myself free from the fear of other people’s opinions. I have learnt how to tame the negative self-talk so that it’s default position is one of support and love.

I carved out a path for myself with a lot of mistakes, hardships and turmoil; one that very well would have been easier had I sought help sooner.

Finding yourself and getting your confidence back needn’t take you ten years but if it does, it’s still a worthwhile journey.

Here is to your self-love, may it ever grow deeper and stronger.

" In a world that profits from your self hate, self love is an act of rebellion"

Katie Nicole

P.S Join me live on Facebook this Wednesday the 19^th April ’17 to set your course to confidence and stop feeling so lost. Check the event out here.