There is nothing more annoying than someone who acts like he or she is better than everyone else.
Most people know someone like this — the type of person who walks around, head tilted too high to the sky, back as straight as a board, arms folded tighter than a knot. These are the types of people with whom nobody wants to associate; these are the overconfident people.
On the other end of the spectrum, there are people who are extremely self-conscious. They walk around slouching, never looking at you straight in the eyes and avoiding questions at every cost. These people have less of a negative impact on their peers but do a lot of damage to themselves.
An under-confident person fails to recognize accomplishments and skills and instead, decides to focus on weaknesses and imperfections. These are the types of people who choose to not associate with anyone because they are afraid of being judged.
Confidence is key. The problem is that finding the right amount of confidence is extremely difficult, and for many people, it can be an extremely stressful process.
The truth is, possessing the correct amount of confidence is detrimental when it comes to building positive and long-lasting relationships in both your personal and professional life.
Often, people fall into one of two categories: overconfident and under-confident. Neither personality trait is very appealing and must be avoided at all costs.
Do not view people as competition, but rather, as teammates.
Overconfident people never listen to others’ ideas and opinions. Why? They view every person to be a threat. An overconfident person always has to be the star and because of this, he or she shuts down external ideas to preserve the spotlight.
Unfortunately, because of this attitude, the person may miss out on really unique ideas or opinions that could benefit his or her career or life.
People who have a balanced level of confidence do not view outside opinions and ideas to be threats, but rather, as essential factors for creating successful ventures and relationships.
People who are confident in themselves and their ideas do not feel as if their images or reputations are at stake if somebody else has something to contribute. The most successful people in this world are able to listen to other people.
Recognize that there will always be people who dislike you.
Sorry to break it to you, but people disliking you for no apparent reason does not end in high school. In all honesty, there will always be people who just simply do not like you or your ideas. This may stem from jealousy or someone’s inability to be open-minded and kind.
Under-confident people tend to struggle to accept this truth and because of this, they spend their entire lives hiding behind other people’s ideas, too afraid to share their own. This leads to people never taking chances because they feel it would be easier to applaud someone else’s work rather than risk someone booing their own.
People who are confident recognize that there will always be someone who does not see things the same way they do. These types of people recognize this reality and use it as motivation to prove naysayers wrong.
Never laugh at other people’s weaknesses
Every person has different strengths and weaknesses. Overconfident people sometimes resort to degrading people who are not as strong as they are in any particular situation.
The reason they do this is because they think that if they laugh at someone else’s weaknesses, it will make them appear to be superior to their peers. In actuality, this only makes a person look like a douche.
A confident person recognizes that just because he or she may be more skilled than another person at one thing doesn’t mean that he or she outranks the person across the board.
Recognize that you aren’t perfect
You may always have a pimple. You may never be good at public speaking. You may always have to work extremely hard to look healthy. No one in this world is perfect.
We are our own toughest critics and under-confident people really take this to heart. Under-confident people pick apart their flaws and because of this, it’s so much more difficult for them to be truly happy.
A confident person recognizes their flaws and imperfections. A key to confidence is having the ability to look past these flaws and recognize that every part of you — weak and strong — contributes to the definition of who you are.
True confidence lies in the ability to not just respect others, but to also respect yourself.
Photo via We Heart It
