Last Updated on September 6, 2024
Being confident is about believing in yourself, about knowing your worth, and about embracing your entirety, flaws and all.
We know that confidence is an integral part of everyday life, but sometimes, it can be a bit challenging to maintain. If you are confident, you’ll have more chances of becoming successful, you’ll be able to interact with others better, and you will have a general feeling of fulfillment.
However, there is that tricky line between confidence and arrogance. So, how do we continue to face life’s challenges while still remaining confident of ourselves, our capacities and capabilities?
Confidence, Not Arrogance
You might think that being confident could mean that you’re becoming arrogant—that’s because confidence is sometimes mistaken for arrogance by a lot of people.
However, there’s a fine line that divides these two polar opposites. Arrogance is a trait that repels people; it’s the negative pole on a magnet. Arrogance is when someone uses their ability to look down on others.
Confidence, on the other hand, is the feeling of being competent in your abilities and skills, while still being grounded by a sense of respect and humility. Confidence is believing in yourself knowing that you are enough.
What Negative Thinking Can Do to You
There are days when you might feel as if you aren’t capable of achieving anything. Some days you might feel that dreaded shadow of fear looming in the corner and you, standing there lacking the confidence needed to banish that fear. Negative thinking can creep up on you like that.
The thing is, if you let that win, it will often lead to inaction or worse, being stuck in a rut, which, in turn, can lead to missed opportunities. A lack of confidence can hold you back. It keeps you from fulfilling your potential.
If you want to shed off that coat of diffidence, you need to put an end to that negative mindset and thoughts.
Be wary of how you speak to yourself. Avoid mentally-degrading tendencies such as blaming yourself, taking people for granted, not socializing enough, feeling hopeless, judging yourself too harshly, and noticing only the negative.
Whenever you catch yourself thinking these negative thoughts, remind yourself to be kind to yourself first. It would be difficult at first—any undertaking that leads to something great often begins with difficulty. However, banishing these unhelpful thoughts will help you slowly gain back or keep your confidence to yourself.
Confidence and Its Numerous Benefits
Confidence is the key if you want to achieve a happy and fulfilled life.
Being confident can dispel fear and anxiety. Confidence gives you the power to calmly take stock of your thoughts. It gives you the drive to become more positive by slowly breaking down the walls built by negative thoughts and over-thinking.
Confidence also gives you greater motivation to pursue goals and activities that you find meaningful. If you’re confident, you’re motivated. If you’re motivated, then you’re more likely to take action to achieve your goals.
You’ll also have a greater chance at success. When you’re confident, you’ll be able to stand up for yourself. You’ll see to it that you’ll be treated fairly by others, as well as by yourself.
When you’re confident, you’ll challenge yourself to have better goals thereby testing your limits. In doing so, you’ll have a better idea about your capabilities, and you’ll be able to learn more about yourself and grow in the process.
These are only some of the benefits that you can get once you fully embrace and integrate confidence into your life.
Gaining Confidence—and Maintaining It
When you’re ready to make the change and embrace confidence, there are many things that you can do to gain and maintain it.
You have it in you to choose having a positive mindset and to learn how to fully accept, love, and respect yourself. Being grateful and being able to look forward to what the future holds are also ways to help you gain and maintain confidence.
One thing that you can do right now that will help you have confidence is to not put things off. Go finish that story you’re writing. Have a go at that brownie recipe that you’ve always wanted to try. Perhaps it’s time that you’ve learned how to ride a bike.
Here are 80 quotes about confidence that can help you on your way to becoming a more confident you:
Confidence Quotes
“Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind.” – Bernard M. Baruch
“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” – Eleanor Roosevelt, This is My Story
“If ever there is tomorrow when we’re not together…there is something you must always remember. You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think. But the most important thing is, even if we’re apart…I’ll always be with you.” – Carter Crocker
“You probably wouldn’t worry about what people think of you if you could know how seldom they do.” – Olin Miller
“Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.” – Bertrand Russell
“Remember that wherever your heart is, there you will find your treasure.” – Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
“Confidence is ignorance. If you’re feeling cocky, it’s because there’s something you don’t know.” – Eoin Colfer, Artemis Fowl
“Man often becomes what he believes himself to be. If I keep on saying to myself that I cannot do a certain thing, it is possible that I may end by really becoming incapable of doing it. On the contrary, if I have the belief that I can do it, I shall surely acquire the capacity to do it even if I may not have it at the beginning.” – Mahatma Gandhi
“Accept who you are; and revel in it.” – Mitch Albom, Tuesdays with Morrie
“The eyes of others our prisons; their thoughts our cages.” – Virginia Woolf
“When someone tells me ‘no,’ it doesn’t mean I can’t do it, it simply means I can’t do it with them.” – Karen E. Quinones Miller
“Success is most often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.” – Coco Chanel, Believing in Ourselves
“A dame that knows the ropes isn’t likely to get tied up.” – Mae West
“We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves strong. The amount of work is the same.” – Carlos Castaneda
“You have no responsibility to live up to what other people think you ought to accomplish. I have no responsibility to be like they expect me to be. It’s their mistake, not my failing.” – Richard P. Feynman, Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!
“When I was a child my mother said to me, ‘If you become a soldier, you’ll be a general. If you become a monk, you’ll be the pope.’ Instead I became a painter and wound up as Picasso.” – Pablo Picasso
“A great man is always willing to be little.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“To share your weakness is to make yourself vulnerable; to make yourself vulnerable is to show your strength.” – Criss Jami
“Never dull your shine for somebody else.” – Tyra Banks
“Every woman that finally figured out her worth, has picked up her suitcases of pride and boarded a flight to freedom, which landed in the valley of change.” – Shannon L. Alder
“I do not care so much what I am to others as I care what I am to myself.” – Michel de Montaigne
“I have often wondered how it is that every man loves himself more than all the rest of men, but yet sets less value on his own opinion of himself than on the opinion of others.” – Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
“I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.” – Edward Everett Hale
“And no one will listen to us until we listen to ourselves.” – Marianne Williamson
“I’ve come to the conclusion that people who wear headphones while they walk, are much happier, more confident, and more beautiful individuals than someone making the solitary drudge to work without acknowledging their own interests and power.” – Jason Mraz
“No man has the right to dictate what other men should perceive, create or produce, but all should be encouraged to reveal themselves, their perceptions and emotions, and to build confidence in the creative spirit.” – Ansel Adams
“Believe in yourself! Have faith in your abilities! Without a humble but reasonable confidence in your own powers you cannot be successful or happy.” – Norman Vincent Peale
“Most men claim to desire driven, independent and confident women. Yet when confronted with such a creature reverence often evolves into resent. For just like women, men need to be needed.” – Tiffany Madison
“Somehow I can’t believe that there are any heights that can’t be scaled by a man who knows the secrets of making dreams come true. This special secret, it seems to me, can be summarized in four Cs. They are curiosity, confidence, courage, and constancy, and the greatest of all is confidence. When you believe in a thing, believe in it all the way, implicitly and unquestionable.” – Walt Disney
“Believe in yourself and there will come a day when others will have no choice but to believe with you.” – Cynthia Kersey
“The better you feel about yourself, the less you feel the need to show off.” – Robert Hand
“You see, the point is that the strongest man in the world is he who stands most alone.” – Henrik Ibsen, An Enemy of the People
“Being brave enough to be alone frees you up to invite people into your life because you want them and not because you need them.” – Mandy Hale, The Single Woman
“’I never seek to defeat the man I am fighting,’ he explained. ‘I seek to defeat his confidence. A mind troubled by doubt cannot focus on the course to victory. Two men are equals – true equals – only when they both have equal confidence.’” – Arthur Golden, Memoirs of a Geisha
“Because of the self-confidence with which he had spoken, no one could tell whether what he said was very clever or very stupid.” – Leo Tolstoy
“You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth of falsehood becomes a matter of life and death to you.” – C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed
“The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark.” – Michelangelo Buonarroti
“Head up, heart open. To better days!” – T.F. Hodge, From Within I Rise
“The only power that exists is inside ourselves.” – Anne Rice, Interview with the Vampire
“When they say the sky’s the limit to me that’s really true.” – Michael Jackson
“I believe with all my heart that the clichés are true, that we are our own best friends and best company, and that if you’re not right for yourself, it’s impossible to be right for anyone.” – Rachel Machacek, The Science of Single
“Don’t worry about who doesn’t like you, who has more, or who’s doing what.” – Erma Bombeck
“You are the community now. Be a lamp for yourselves. Be your own refuge. Seek for no other. All things must pass. Strive on diligently. Don’t give up.” – Buddha
“There can be no friendship without confidence, and no confidence without integrity.” – Samuel Johnson
“Believe it can be done. When you believe something can be done, really believe, your mind will find the ways to do it. Believing a solution paves the way to solution.” – David J. Schwartz, The Magic of Thinking Big
“And suddenly she knew exactly why Catherine had fallen in love with him. It wasn’t that he was unusually attractive, or ambitious, or even charming. He was partly those things, but more important, he seemed to live life on his own terms.” – Nicholas Sparks, Message in a Bottle
“If I could not be persuaded into doing what I thought wrong, I will never be tricked into it.” – Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey
“The best lightning rod for your protection is your own spine.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Don’t be surprised by your greatness. Be surprised that no one expected it.” – Rebecca Maizel, Infinite Days
“Live life as though nobody is watching, and express yourself as though everyone is listening.” – Nelson Mandela
“I see at intervals the glance of a curious sort of bird through the close set bars of a cage: a vivid, restless, resolute captive is there; were it but free, it would soar cloud-high.” – Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
“No name-calling truly bites deep unless, in some dark part of us, we believe it. If we are confident enough then it is just noise.” – Laurell K. Hamilton, A Stroke of Midnight
“You can’t make yourself feel positive, but you can choose how to act, and if you choose right, it builds your confidence.” – Julien Smith, The Flinch
“Maybe if I act well enough, I’ll come to believe it myself.” – Garth Nix, Abhorsen
“The deep roots never doubt spring will come.” – Marty Rubin
“Happiness and confidence are the prettiest things you can wear” – Taylor Swift
“Always Remember to take your Vitamins: Take your Vitamin A for ACTION, Vitamin B for Belief, Vitamin C for Confidence ,Vitamin D for Discipline, Vitamin E for Enthusiasm!!” – Pablo
“People who repeatedly attack your confidence and self-esteem are quite aware of your potential, even if you are not.” – Wayne Gerard Trotman
“Life can take so many twists and turns. You can’t ever count yourself out. Even if you’re really afraid at some point, you can’t think that there’s no room for you to grow and do something good with your life.” – Portia de Rossi
“There is strange comfort in knowing that no matter what happens today, the Sun will rise again tomorrow.” – Aaron Lauritsen, 100 Days Drive
“Walk amongst the natives by day, but in your heart be Superman.” – Gene Simmons
“Beethoven said that it’s better to hit the wrong note confidently, than hit the right note unconfidently. Never be afraid to be wrong or to embarrass yourself; we are all students in this life, and there is always something more to learn.” – Mike Norton
“I know that mirrors give us a false sense of confidence.” I continued. “The reflection that we see everyday has nothing to do with how others see us. The glass lies.” – Rasmenia Massoud, Human Detritus
“Sometimes, some lies spoken with high confidence could be more receptive than facts spoken with doubt.” – Toba Beta, Master of Stupidity
“…Granny Weatherwax, who had walked nightly without fear in the bandit-haunted forests of the mountains all her life in the certain knowledge that the darkness held nothing more terrible than she was…” – Terry Pratchett
“If you doubt you can accomplish something, then you can’t accomplish it. You have to have confidence in your ability, and then be tough enough to follow through.” – Rosalynn Carter
“A clear vision, backed by definite plans, gives you a tremendous feeling of confidence and personal power.” – Brian Tracy, The Gift of Self-Confidence
“Trying to build myself up with the fact that I have done things right that were even good and have had moments that were excellent but the bad is heavier to carry around and feel have no confidence.” – Marilyn Monroe, Fragments
“Once you embrace your value, talents and strengths, it neutralizes when others think less of you.” – Rob Liano
“Her grandmother had once told her that one of life’s best lessons was not being afraid to look foolish — to just ask the question.” – Melissa Senate
“Your greatness is revealed not by the lights that shine upon you, but by the light that shines within you.” – Ray A. Davis
“The biggest human temptation is to settle for too little.” – Thomas Merton
“I think the best role models for women are people who are fruitfully and confidently themselves, who bring light into the world.” – Meryl Streep
“The church says the earth is flat; but I have seen its shadow on the moon, and I have more confidence even in a shadow than in the church.” – Ferdinand Magellan
“His own image; no longer a dark, gray bird, ugly and disagreeable to look at, but a graceful and beautiful swan. To be born in a duck’s nest, in a farmyard, is of no consequence to a bird, if it is hatched from a swan’s egg.” – Hans Christian Andersen, The Ugly Duckling
“He who has truth at his heart need never fear the want of persuasion on his tongue.” – John Ruskin, The Stones of Venice
“When you have to kill the same terrorist twice in one week, then there’s either something wrong with your skills or something wrong with your world. And there’s nothing wrong with my skills.” – Jonathan Maberry, Patient Zero
“My mind may be sober, but my confidence is high!” – Habeeb Akande
“My message to you all is of hope, courage, and confidence.” – Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah
“Confidence in others’ honesty is no light testimony of one’s own integrity.” – Michel de Montaigne
