What Exactly is "Self-Confidence"

   

Acceptance, that is what self-confidence is exactly, being self-confident means accepting yourself for what you stand for and who you are. 

You gain self-confidence by; Accepting yourself. 

    That is literally one of the best things you can do to gain confidence. Actually, it's the only thing you can do.  You see the opposite of self-confidence is doubt and skepticism.   

    Self-confidence is defined as being assured and certain in your skills 

    

    Whereas 

    Doubt/skepticism is you having a feeling of uncertainty or lack conviction 

    

    Self-confidence cannot be built in a single day, you cannot just wake up, post a selfie with a "loving myself" caption and decide that you are self-confident. No ma, Self-confidence goes into deep layers, you have to start from deep down in yourself, you have to recognize your flaws and own them, that's you being certain about exactly who you are.   

    Now here's my problem with self-confidence.   

    It's confused with either being "too proud" or "too lazy"

   

    Self Confidence confused with laziness. 

   

    "Be confident about your flaws"

   This is a statement that's some people's wallpapers and some people's Instagram captions, this is a positive statement cause you should be confident about your flaws but some people see this as a reason to walk out without bathing or brushing or basically taking care of yourself because you know "self-confidence", people almost always use "self-confidence" as a reason to be slouches and lazy, that is wrong. Instead of being "confident" about your flaws, try something different. 

    "Accept your flaws" 

    This doesn't seem so different from the first one does it? but trust me there's a difference. There was a time in school, I was always self-conscious about my acne, I mean who wasn't right? The whole pimples thing and spots does not sit well with anyone. My pimples were something I was and am very self-aware of, once I see a bump on my head, I try my absolute best to get rid of it, my mum noticed how I would apply creams and all of that so she called to talk to me. My mum gave me a speech that all I could take from was "let it be"- I should stop applying creams, keep it out of my prayer points and whatever I did to keep those bloody pimples off my face, cause " it's puberty and what not", sigh. Worst mistake ever. 

I was self-conscious about my pimples right?, I took care of them all the time like I said. If I'd see a single dot on my face I'd want it off the following day, I mean didn't take huge care of my acne but I regulated it and when my mum said I should "let nature take its course" they became worse and by worse I mean it was honestly like I was harvesting a population on my face, plus they itched like hell. They were absolutely terrible.     

    Where exactly am I going here?    

    My acne got worse when I didn't take care of it. Acne was my flaw (as it is for so many of us) and the lazy self-confident person would say "oh I have pimples, that is my flaw I can't do anything about it so I'm gonna rear my pimples and name them" this is lazy self-confidence.     

    What an actual confident person would do is recognize their flaws and if this flaw can be corrected they would correct it especially if this flaw isn't natural like no. Acne is not natural to me. That crap is sent from the dirty pits of hell. An actually confident person would be like "oh this huge thing does not look good on me I'm gonna go watch some youtube beauty tips and get them off" this is you making an effort on your skin because face it, If you don't feel pretty; you won't look pretty, it is that simple. Only you know how you feel and if by some way you feel "man I look hot with pimples" that's self-confidence too as long as you aren't lying to yourself and you somehow actually do look nice with your pimples. Cause your lazy doesn't mean you should settle for less if you can change something you actually do not like or something that does not make you feel pretty change it. Or at least try.   

    You see without my pimples I always felt confident about talking to people and actually relating cause I was assured I didn't look totally terrible. I was assured that everything wasn't perfect but was tolerable but when my acne came back Lord knows it caused so much anxiety everytime I passed a reflective surface I would see huge bumps on my face, they weren't pretty, most importantly I didn't feel pretty.  

    Self-confidence, as I said, comes from you, inside, accepting yourself, once you've known your flaws and know them, not a single soul can make you feel bad about it. 

  Self-confidence as being "too proud"

When most people think about confidence what comes to mind is pride

Let me be the first to tell you there is a difference between self-confidence and confidence

 What I am talking about is self confidence; when you describe yourself as self-confident, you know not everyone has to know of your abilities but you, cause your thought about yourself is usually almost all that matters, you know that you are a beautiful person inside and out (because you can just be a beautiful person outside that makes you, less beautiful)

People usually confuse confidence with self-confidence because when someone is confident in the abilities and characteristics they tend to be more outspoken, it's confused with being "too proud", and the truth is when you are self-confident you have accepted your self for who you are and you are self-aware of your flaws and what not, hardly anything can phase you, you start doing things differently, taking risks, meeting new people and so on, you are becoming a whole new self-confident human being, your world will shift a bit, things will change, that is how you know there's progress. As a self-confident person ,there's no need for the show everyone else. That's just the truth there was there is absolutely no need for you to show everyone because you know in your heart about your abilities and exactly who you are, what you want to be and everything you are becoming.

 You don't need anyone else to tell you that. The fact that you know is perfectly enough for you.

Although self-confidence actually goes hand in hand with confidence, in the sense that, when are you become self-confident you instantly attain confidence. So you can technically say confidence comes after self-confidence because if you know what you carry, you know, you don't have to scream out to everyone else just a simple whisper will do the trick because you already are aware of your abilities, anyone else telling you is merely just hype.

Self-confidence comes from you and nobody else, you should never allow anyone to define your confidence that's the whole point of it Self-confidence is about YOU, not THEM, accept YOURSELF love YOURSELF just be happy and proud of where you are, you couldn't have gotten this far without God and yourself. Recognize that.