Have you loved yourself?

Hello, Good Readers :D

Meet me again here. How’s life today? I hope you are in a very good condition today, because we are going to continue our journey to read the review of a very good book by David Lawrence Preston, 365 Steps to Self-Confidence. In this post, I would like to review from chapter 17^th up to 35^th. Let’s say, “Wow” together with me, haha I know this kind of a very long post. However, even though it is such a very long post, I promise it is going to be fun to read this post because every chapter presented a very useful information for helping to be more and more confident. So, there is no need to say anything again, let’s check it out! Happy Reading!

Chapter 17 – Childhood

In this chapter, David said that our childhood unexpectedly could affect our self-confidence as well. Do you remember when you were a child your parents, guardians or your older relatives had told you not to do something? For example, "Don't climb that tree! You'll fall", "Don't bring this all! You can't”, or when you could not do something your parents were going to say, " Why couldn't you do this? You're so stupid".  Well, I think every person had been through some kind of these things, so do you, and so do I. According to this book, all of those cases could also affect our self-confidence. Also, when you were a child and then you made mistakes or achievement, your parents either must give you punishment and rewards. Something about punishment and rewards from your childhood that affect your confidence is called conditioning.

In addition, this chapter will offer us seven confidence builders that can help us to know, what words from our parents that affect our confidence when we were child, and what kind of conditioning that we have gotten when we were a child. Well, I think I myself did not have that moment when my parents' words seemed affecting my self-confidence. However, if you have, you can write on the comment box below this post and share your experiences.

Chapter 18 - Control Dramas

We are going to still talk about our childhood. Well, indeed, whether we realize it or not, our parents attitude, their way to get attention, attract something or to do anything could affect our attitude as well. Why? It is because when we were a child, all we saw everyday was them, our parents. We duplicated everything we saw from them into ourselves. All our parents attitude which affected our attitude is called control dramas. In this chapter, David took an idea from James Radfield's book titled The Celestine Prophecy that there are four types control dramas that we mostly have, such as intimidator, interrogator, aloof, and poor me. Once we are aware what control dramas we have affected from our parents, we can try to control it, change it, and left it behind so we can build the new and amazing of us.

In addition, this chapter will present us seven confidence builder that can help us to know which types of dramas that we have now based on our parents treated us where we were children, whether we are intimidators, interrogators, aloofs or worse poor mes. Well,  I myself are not so sure which dramas that I took from my parents. It is because nowadays sometimes I act differently. I mean, sometimes I can be like the interrogator, poor me (it is now make me feel ewh about myself), aloof (most of), and sometimes I can be the intimidator as well. Well, I started to think that maybe I have more than one personality or what, oh my god. I'm just kidding.

Chapter 19 - Take Care of Your Inner Child

This chapter is quite confusing even for me. Well, in this chapter, David told us that our Inner Child can affect our happiness and confidence if we do not take care of it. Still do not understand? Here. According to this chapter, we, as adults, must have our inner child on inside of our body, and this is always with us wherever we go. Do you ever feel like you need attention, love, and you feel vulnerable and so on? That is the inner child of you. Some people do not have a great childhood. Some people got bullied where they were child, and they could have been you. When we were children, we might not be able to do something, and then we felt so bad about it, about ourselves and we have been bringing it till we grew up, till now. Consequently, we feel bad about ourselves till now, like we are stupid, we are not useful, we are not good enough and another ungood feelings. This, if we want to be happier, confident, and feeling good about ourselves, we have to forgive ourselves as a child that could not do something. We have to take care of them so that we could feel more confident and happier.

In addition, this chapter included seven confidence builders that can help us to know more about our inner children, to understand what they need, and after that we can feel better about ourselves in the past and face a better bright future. Finally, in this chapter, David gave an example about a woman named Celia. She could not be happier when she kept blaming herself because when she was a child her mom did not want her. However, after she try to take care of her inner child, she does not blame her as a child again. She realize that it was not her fault, but her mother's. Then, after that she does not blame herself anymore, and she can feel happier in life.

Chapter 20 - Forgive, Forget and Be Free

This chapter will guide us how to forgive whoever has hurt us with whatever they did to us. Whomever that has hurt us and because of them we lost our own self-proud. They could be our parents, our exes, our friends, and/or whomever. It is because we can not feel any happiness if all he wave in our heart are revenge, and anger for someone that hurt us in the past. Forgive them, and then we feel we free. If we're not, it just makes us stuck on that, and we will not grow any better. 

In addition, this chapter will present us seven confidence builders that included affirmations, advise, steps that can help us to learn to forgive all of them in the past that has made us feel uncomfortable about ourselves until now. Finally, this chapter will present us a story that can help us to forgive whomever we always blame for what we are today, until all we can send for them is just love, no hate.

Chapter 21 - Let Go of The Past

Everyone has past. Whether it is a good past, or a bad past. However, there are part our bad past that really really affect us, that we always remember every time, and this is that make us feel unhappy, and confident. Therefore, this chapter will guide us how to let go of our past, let go of them. Not every of us is fortune to have all good past in our back. Some of us could have a very bad past that can affect us. For example, a victim of raped, or an accident that really affect their future. Here, I know that, how you feel about it, but you need to let go of it. It is because unless you let go of it, you'll feel bad all the time.

As always, this chapter will present seven confidence builders that can help us, train us to let go of whatever happened in our past that make us feel really bad about ourselves. Finally, in this chapter, David presents us a story that so inspiring for us, it will inspire us to be easily letting go our worst past.

Chapter 22 - Self-acceptance

I do love this chapter, personally. It is because self-acceptance is one of the most important thing to build our confidence. Hence, if we can not accept the way we are, all of this effort to be more confident are going to be useless. People are different. That's what makes us special. I sometimes also feel bad about myself, feel I am not good enough, feel stupid and so on. I also often compare myself with others. That is so frustrating and tiring. So, from now on I really want to change the way I accept myself, I hope you will do it together with me.

As usually, this chapter will present you seven confidence builders that will allow us to accept any parts of ourselves. I do really love the 7th confidence builder of this chapter a.k.a the 154th confidence of all. Here I would give you a picture of it: 

Finally, this chapter will present us a very inspiring story of Evelyn Glennie. She is deaf but rather than feels bad about that, she is grateful of that. In addition, rather than calls herself deaf, she calls herself has different kind of hearing. Now, despite being completely deaf since the age of 11, Evelyn is one of the world’s top classical percussionists, feted all over the world, performing barefoot to help her feel vibrations from the other instruments.

Chapter 23 - Body Image 

Body image can also affect our confidence. I agree with that. Many people does not feel comfortable about their body, that people could be you, and could be me as well. Why can body image affect our confidence? Sure it is because how can we feel confident if we do not feel good about our own body? This chapter will help us to feel more comfortable with our body.
 

In addition, this chapter will present us seven confidence builders that can help us to feel more comfortable about our own body. This is very useful. If you want to read this chapter more, here is the link to download the book: 365 Steps to Self-Confidence by David Lawrence Preston

Chapter 24 - Get In Shape

Getting in shape physically is a wonderful way of building our confidence and self-image. It’s not easy to feel confident if we are overweight, and exhausted after climbing a flight of stairs. Who does not care about health? Is that you? Come on! It is time to be more aware about our health. It is because health is the important thing. Do you remember the quote, "Health is expensive"? Therefore, from now on we need to be more aware about our health. In addition, this chapter will present seven confidence builders that can help us to be healthier than we were used to be.

Chapter 25 - Calmness and Confidence

In this chapter, David relates calmness and confidence. He said, calmness is part of confidence. Well said, because I agree with him. Do you ever feel nervous when you want to do a presentation in front of teacher and friends? When you start standing up from your seat and walking to front of the class, your hands are a little bit shaking, and your body vibrates. Furthermore, when you start to say what you are going to say, like poof!! you will suddenly forget all of the words. If you have been through those things, well we are same though. This is why I agree with David, the writer of this book. When you cannot calm yourself, how can you feel confident? When all parts of your body is shaking in front of your friends, how can you feel confident? See? This is so important, isn't this? Therefore, we need to learn how to relax in every situation we must face. When we relax, we will feel more comfortable so that we can be confident.

According to this book, we can easuly get calm and relax if just we would like to practice these two skills, such as:

1. Entering a peaceful, deeply relaxed state so that you can recharge your batteries. Make the most of techniques such as autosuggestion, mental rehearsal, anchoring and reframing.

2. Instant calmers. Learn to calm down instantly and stay calm, so that you can deal with awkward people and situations with ease.

In addition, this chapter will present seven confidence builders that can help us to acquire those skills step by step. As a consequence, we will be able to be calm and relax to face every situation so that we will feel more confident.

Chapter 26 – Anchoring
 

This chapter will help you to learn how to do anchoring. According to this book, anchoring is a way of drawing on past experiences in which you felt confident to help you cope better in the present. It’s another powerful weapon in your confidence armoury. An anchor is any stimulus that consistently triggers an emotion. To use an anchor you have to do several particular things. If we can use the anchor correctly, it can help us to control our calmness so that we can be more relax and confident. In addition, this chapter will present us seven confidence builders that will help us to install or use properly our anchors. Finally, this chapter presents us a story about Angela who finally can be more confidence after she practice all the lesson from her confidence course, such as positive thinking, relaxation, visualization, and small steps to make all of them work.

Chapter 27 - So Far, So Good

This chapter is only about reviewing the result of everything we have done and we have gotten from the first time we read this book. It is more like a reflection. We will find these questions on this chapter: Have you felt more confident? Have you practice all of the confidence builders that you have read? Have you practice the Four Step Method and the I-T-I-A Formula, and etc. In addition, this chapter will also present you some questions to make sure, and to help you to know how far you go, how far your self-confidence are grown.

Chapter 28 - Find A Purpose

Purpose. This word makes me remember of Justin Bieber's song with the same title. A purpose is important. When you do not have a purpose in your life? What are you doing now? You will, absolutely, feel your life is meaningless, right? There’s nothing more important than finding a purpose that inspires and motivates you and gives your life meaning and direction. There’s nothing more soul destroying than drifting through life with nothing to strive for, no ambitions, no goals. Aimlessness destroys confidence and self-esteem. Therefore, from now on, find your purpose! 

In addition, if you have a dream and then you have managed to achieve that, so now do not have a dream anymore, you will feel not on fire anymore. You will feel like, "Oh, I have reached my dream, I do not need anything else". If you feel like that, you will not get anything better in your life now. So, I repeat it again, from now on find your purpose! The big one! So you will have a long time to achieve it and you will feel a fire everyday to achieve that dream. Fortunately, this chapter will present us seven confidence that can help us finding what our purpose really is so that we can find something to fight for in our life.

Chapter 29 - Goals Revisited

This chapter will invite us to be more serious about our goals. We need to make a realistic goals, such as do some small steps every day to achieve our goals. According to this book there are several reasons why we should make our goals be clear and more realistic, such as they clarify your purpose, they show you’re serious about achieving, they stimulate excitement, anticipation, energy and enthusiasm, and etc. If you want to find more reasons, you can read them on the full book.

As always, this chapter will present us seven confidence builders that can help us to make our realistic goals so that we can be more confident and getting closer with our goals each day. Finally, this chapter tell us the history when the President of America have a goal to send people to the moon and sent them back to Earth safely. The president's goal made American's astronauts team felt exited and then they tried to find a way  to realize the goal, until they finally could make his goal happened with Neil Amstrong as the first person who managed to take a step in the moon in 1969.

Chapter 30 - The Thinker Thinks and The Prover Proves

As we have known, we have our conscious part and subconscious part in our mind. According to this book, our conscious mind is a Thinker, and our subconscious mind is a Prover. For example, when we think, "I'm not a clever person", it is our conscious mind that works. After that, our subconscious mind will find every way to prove that what I think about we are is true. In relation to this case, our subconscious mind will find every way to prove that we are not clever. Therefore, we need to change the way we think about we are. We need to always think that we are good, clever, worthy, and deserving. 

In addition, we will be presented seven confidence builders that can help us to learn more to make us thinking more positively, so that our subconscious mind can prove the positive thing for us as well.

Chapter 31 - Confident Self-talk

Just exactly the way the title of this chapter is, this 31st chapter will present us to improve our unconfident and full-hesitated self- talk to be confident self-talk. Confident self-talk includes any language that helps us feel better and cope more easily. When we think like a confident person, we automatically feel more confident and act more confidently. On the other hand, if we think like a loser, we automatically feel like a loser and act like one. Makes sense, doesn’t it? 

Therefore, this chapter will present us seven confidence builders that can help us to change our mindset and our self-talk to be better and to be more confident. Every step or confidence builder in this chapter will help us to change our self-talk to be as positive as possible, so that the results that we will achieve are going to be positive as well.

Chapter 32 – Beliefs

In this chapter, we will be presented with a deeper and clearer explanation about our beliefs that can help us to be more confident. A belief is a collection of thoughts that we accept as true. Most of our belief have their origins in childhood conditioning and our cultural background: they were absorbed without any effort on our part. According to this chapter, if have a belief that we cannot do something, we will never be able to do it. On the opposite, if we have belief that we can do something, we will be able to do it no matter how hard it is. It is same with, if we have belief or try to plant a belief that we are confident, and we can be confident, we will be able to be act confident, and so on.

Furthermore, this chapter will present us seven confidence builders that can help us to plant good beliefs about our ability and capability, ourselves, and our confidence. So that, we can be better and better , and be more confident every day.

Chapter 33 - Confident Attitude

Attitudes and beliefs, while closely related, are not exactly the same. A belief is a thought or mental image we accept as true. An attitude is what you put out into the world through your words and actions. For example, a belief such as ‘I’m not good enough’ will manifest in your speech and behavior. That’s when it becomes an attitude. In addition, attitudes involve a degree of evaluation, in other words, what you feel about the belief.

A positive attitude shows in everything you do – how you walk, talk, what you say, how you say it, and the way others see you. It builds confidence and success in every area of your life. When you conquer attitudes of doubt and fear you effectively conquer feelings of failure. And the good news is, positive attitudes can be developed, using the Four Step Method and the I-T-I-A Formula©. In addition, this chapter spells out seven attitudes on the seven confidence builders which are essential for confidence, self-esteem, happiness and peace of mind.

Chapter 34 - Self-love

In this chapter, David a.k.a the writer of this book will bring us to be more aware of our self-love. This is also one of my favorite chapters of this book. It is because the topic of self-love is what I really like to read whenever and wherever, whether it is just in the picture about self-love quote, or a quote from a book, and many more. However first, do you know what self-love is? In my opinion, self-love is the way we love ourselves. Furthermore, self-love is when we put our needs first before someone else needs, and we put our happiness first before someone else happiness. Maybe it sound a little bit egoist, but no, it’s not. We need to realize that we are important, too. Our health, our body, our mind, and our feelings are important, too. Sometimes, we always want to make people happy until we forget about our own happiness. Don’t do that, guys. We need to take care of ourselves as much as we take care of someone else. Besides, it is an important term if we want to be more confident. How can we feel more confident if we do not love ourselves?

In addition, this chapter will present us seven confidence builders that can help us to be more aware of our self-love, and to love ourselves deeper and deeper. Finally, we will be presented of a story about Dawn who did not love herself at all at first. She always thought that she was a mess, she was a failure, and she is stupid so that she always feel the pain, hurt and the worst part of this life. However, after she knew the I-T-I-A Formula and the Four Step Method, she becomes more aware of her self-love, she loves herself more, and now she can live life more happily. What an inspiring story. I hope after you read this chapter of the book, you can be more aware to love yourself and put your happiness first before others.

Chapter 35 – Concentrate on What You Do Well

We knew that everybody, every human being has strengths and also weaknesses, including ourselves. However, rather than focus on improving our strength, we often only focus on our weaknesses. For example, in the context of learning English, maybe we cannot do well at speaking, but it’s okay, maybe we can do very well at writing. It is a good thing, too. Remember what Einstein said, “Everyone is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree. It will take its whole life believing that it is stupid”. The meaning of the quote is, just like what I have said before, it is okay if cannot do something well, because we must have something that we can do better.

In addition, this chapter will present us seven very helpful confidence builders that will be able to help us knowing what strengths that we truly have in ourselves  and how to keep focusing on it. With that, we can be more confident to show up our abilities. Furthermore, we also would be helped to learn something new that we thought we cannot do it, and be master of it.

There we are, guys. Such a very long post, isn’t it? Well, I agree with you. However, I hope you can find my post is useful for you. Thank you for visiting my blog. Please give your comment and support here if you don’t mind. Have a nice day, guys. Much love.