Okay, I don’t want to sound like a broken record player saying “confidence is key” over and over again, but it has a lot to do with being happy, and it has even more to do with success. Can you be successful without being super confident? Of course, but there are plenty of studies that show that success and confidence feed off each other.

Why? Because confidence drives us to try new things that we might not without. It increases our chances of rebounding successfully and quickly, because we don’t take failure as personally, rather more of an occupational hazard. People with self confidence are better at selling themselves and more likely to get the job. And a big one? Self confident people are less likely to constantly compare themselves to other, because they know that though the other person is great, they have their pluses too, even if they are different.

Some tips to help raise your self convenience:

• Know yourself: Knowing yourself is the first step to getting to the point to accepting your flaws (while still working on them of course) and knowing your strengths. Get to the point that you can ramble off ten or fifteen things you absolutely love about yourself talent wise, then do it again physically, and again emotionally/relationship wise. When you start this it’ll be super hard, you might have to make the lists over a few weeks to begin with. But get to the point that you know your strengths and you know your pluses.
• Build on them: Okay, so you know what you’re good at, how can you be even better at them? Constantly grow. Constantly improve. Keep it up to date, it’ll bring you pride and it’ll bring to confidence.
• Stop critiquing others: Yeah, gossip is everywhere, and I don’t think it’s possible to rid yourself of it completely, but when you get better about seeing the good in others, you’ll also get better at seeing the good in yourself. See people’s effort, see people’s humor, see people’s dedication. In return you’ll start seeing yours.
• Stop comparing: I know this is a tip everyone knows, but maybe if people say it enough it’ll be so embedded in your head that when you go “he’s so much better at this than me,” you can shake your head at yourself and say “I’m good in a different way” or “of course he is I just started to learn about this a few months ago, give me a few more and I’ll be better.” You won’t stop comparing yourself completely, but you can get to the point where you correct yourself right after, and then the number of times you have to do that will slowly decrease.