This is no simple question.

Our confidence is greatly affected by our memories, values, previous decisions and environment. I always tell people that competence is the flip-side of confidence. When you get good at (doing) something, your confidence rises. And likewise when you get more confident at something, you perform better, which raises your competence at that task. So it is like the old riddle – “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?” The answer is it doesn’t matter, as long as you have both a chicken and an egg, as they are interlinked and there could not be one without the other.  So it is with confidence and competence.

Lesson for today: build your competence in your targeted task, job or hobby in small steps to gain more self-trust and positive feedback from others, so that your confidence rises up a few notches. That will in turn show on your face and in your voice and body language, starting off a very positive ripple-effect. After a while of small successes you can look back at your journey and see the great accomplishments, and feel the stronger confidence gained from your personal goal-achievements.

Now go climb a small mountain! (figuratively, of course!)