Over the next few weeks, I am looking at common thoughts that people with low self-esteem have, found within this Buzzfeed article, and how we can possibly address them. For the full list, click here.

Low confidence and self-esteem is so damaging to a life. It’s so important to love yourself to be successful in work, relationships and to find genuine happiness. Everyone wants to be confident in their abilities, skills and general self.

Can you be 100% confident??? I don’t believe so. Even the most self-assured people will doubt themselves from time to time. The difference is, these self-confident people will bounce back from setbacks and not let a lack of confidence take control of their decisions in life. Those with low self-esteem will take setbacks harder, and be far more prone to anxiety, stress and depression.

So what can you do to build your own self-confidence?

• Follow your own passions and goals. Particularly when young, it is easy to do what your parents, teachers, siblings or friends want you to do, rather than take up hobbies and interests that you want. Start doing more of what you enjoy! Try to think of one physical activity (running, yoga, netball, football, power walking…anything that gets you active!) and one non-physical (blogging, reading, sewing, baking, learning a language…anything that gets you thinking or creating!). Then take it up and do it often. This will build your self-confidence as you make progress (no matter how slowly) and  realise how capable you are. If you’re not sure what you enjoy, try anything until you do 🙂

• Build healthy relationships with yourself and others. Firstly, start speaking more kindly to yourself. Whenever you catch yourself saying something mean to yourself, stop and ask whether you would say that to a friend. If not, then you do not deserve it either. Secondly, consider carefully your current relationships. Do they make you feel good about yourself? Do they bring you happiness? If not, then start reducing the time you spend with them, or even taking a break from that person altogether.

• Face your fears. The best way to build self-confidence is to face what you are afraid of. I used to be terrified of speaking to good-looking men. I actually used to avoid them by walking the opposite way sometimes!! I was so scared of making a fool of myself. But when you run away from your fears, you are only reinforcing the idea that the ‘thing’ you are most afraid of happening will indeed happen. If you face the fear head on, the likelihood is the outcome will be no way near as bad as you pictured in your head. This will give you the confidence to face the fear more and more until you lose it altogether!