The Many Flavors of Confidence
Did you know that confidence isn’t just one thing?
There are actually many kinds of confidence, and when you know about all of them, you can understand why your confidence fluctuates so much, and give yourself credit for the confidence you do have.
I call these flavors of confidence instead just “types” of confidence, because each one has a distinct inner experience. It makes you feel a certain way — determined, or excited, or soothed, say — but it also has its own, well, flavor.1 When you get to know these flavors, you get better at noticing the first hints that some confidence is welling up, and you can stick with it and help it come out more fully, instead of getting distracted and missing the moment.
Like the colors of the rainbow, there’s a whole gradient of kinds of confidence, but as with colors, I find it useful to chop up the spectrum into a manageable number of types. So let’s look at the five main flavors of confidence.
Shining Confidence
Shining Confidence is a sense of self-assurance about your value and your gifts that helps you put yourself out there without feeling embarrassed.
It often gets confused with arrogance and show-offiness, but those are compensations from a lack of true Shining Confidence. With Shining Confidence, you don’t need to prove itself — you already know.
If you can’t seem to pipe up in meetings with important stakeholders, cringe when you receive a compliment, and “do not wish to be perceived,” you could use more access to your Shining Confidence.
Adventurous Confidence
Adventurous Confidence is a trust in yourself to navigate the new and the unknown.
It can be confused with foolhardiness — a lack of respect for how hard life can be. Adventurous Confidence isn’t about denial or being underprepared; it’s about being in touch with your own resourcefulness, which helps you see life as more of an adventure than an onslaught.
If you’re passing up new opportunities because you don’t know if you can handle them, or if you’re having trouble adjusting to your new job, more access to Adventurous Confidence might be just the ticket.
Strong Confidence
Strong Confidence is a conviction that you matter, which helps you stand up for yourself (and anyone or anything that you care about).
It can be confused with being uncompromising and always looking for a fight. True Strong Confidence is about being so sure that you matter that you don’t need to convince other people of it by throwing your weight around or picking fights. Sometimes you can advocate for yourself effectively by just asking a question or calmly stating a boundary. Other times it takes more ferocity. With Strong Confidence, you can access that whole range instead of only being “nice” or only being combative.
If you’re feeling walked all over or just can’t stop yourself from putting others before yourself, your Strong Confidence may be blocked.
Accepting Confidence
Accepting Confidence is the deep knowing that you’re good enough even though you’re an imperfect human being.
Accepting Confidence can be confused with complacency, but the difference is that Accepting Confidence distinguishes between you and your work. There is such a thing as work that isn’t good enough. But even when that happens, you are still good enough.
If you’re avoiding starting your work, or avoiding calling it done, because you’re afraid of doing a less than perfect job, unblocking your Accepting Confidence might really move the needle.
Steady Confidence
Steady Confidence is the determination and grounding to carry on when things are hard or confusing, and success is not guaranteed.
People often think that what they need here is strict self-discipline or external accountability. Clients have told me that they want their manager to hold their feet to the fire, or their accountability buddy to be harder on them. But Steady Confidence provides a more pleasant way to get things done. Instead of panicking yourself into action, you can feel calm and get enough traction to keep going.
If you find yourself dreading and procrastinating on certain tasks, or bouncing off of them because the whole thing feels overwhelming, unblocking your Steady Confidence could be really helpful.
What’s your confidence profile?
Discover Your Flavors of Confidence to find out which ones you’re strong in and which ones are blocked for you!
If you’d like help unblocking one or more flavors, check out my confidence coaching program, On Solid Ground.
- I learned to experience these flavors through the coaching academy that I study and mentor at, Aletheia. They are also inspired by The Diamond Approach and Tibetan Buddhism. The five flavors of confidence are my own expression of these teachings and of my direct experience of these flavors, adapted for the specific needs of my clients. ↩︎