It’s okay to be scared, often that’s a sign that you are pushing yourself towards greatness. However, it’s equally important to build up your confidence and we hope the conversations presented below can help provide some food for thought around how you can level up your confidence and self-esteem.

Ana Gabriela Honsowetz

I’ve always said that my best and worst quality is my overwhelming confidence. It’s helped me succeed in my career and also landed me in some tricky situations.

Since I was a child, I’ve always felt the need to prove I could do anything. As the second-born, I constantly looked up to my older sister—I wanted to do everything she could do and more. Our relationship, even with its ups and downs like most siblings, gave me a strong sense of belief in myself. She was one of my biggest supporters, and having her in my corner gave me the courage to dream big. Read More>>

Jessica Ray

From a young age I lacked self confidence being not only one of the few that looked like me from elementary to high school, but during my elementary years I was on the larger side, which opened doors to bullies and mean girls who pretended to be my friend. And that is where I began my passion in hair. I began doing styles on myself along with gaining interest in sports, particularly basketball. Towards the middle of middle school, I began to lose weight, became a key contributor to the girls basketball team and known for braiding hair and having cute hairstyles. Read More>>

Sarah Williams

Confidence and self-esteem are things I think a lot of us struggle with. I don’t believe anyone is ever 100% “confident” 100% of the time, which means if you don’t feel confident right now, that’s totally normal! With that said, I was lucky enough to have a family who never let me forget I have value, and that with hard work I could do whatever I dreamed of doing. Growing up with that strong support system has helped to shape the way I look at obstacles – they are never “insurmountable”; with the right focus, practice, forethought, etc., anything can be overcome.  Read More>>

Kevin Stone

I have been performing in front of live audiences all around the world. I know I’m very good at what I do. I have been performing for over 30 years. So, my confidence comes from years and years of practice and being among many different audiences and cultures. Read More>>

Olga

It took me years to sign up for coach training and fully embrace it as my career, even though I’ve dreamed of doing it for so long. For a long time, I wrestled with the question: “Who am I to do this?” I had always been drawn to deep conversations, to understanding what makes people feel alive, seen, and whole. But the idea of becoming a coach, of guiding others in their lives, felt audacious. My life wasn’t perfectly sorted. I didn’t have all the answers. Didn’t I need to have it all squared away before I was qualified to help others? Read More>>

Rikki Sushaun

Oh that’s easy, I’m the stereotypical middle child! Though it is a bit more complicated than that because I’m also the oldest.

I believe it was in the cards for me all along to be a bold and charismatic individual. Not that I’ve ever felt I needed to prove anything to anybody, but more so, I have always had this understanding that life is whatever you make of it. Read More>>

Hannah (nickname Jewels) Clark

Remember that confidence isn’t about never feeling doubt—it’s about moving forward despite it. Surround yourself with people who believe in you, keep working on your craft, and trust that setbacks don’t define you. And, like my mom always said, God has not given you a spirit of fear—so don’t live like you have one. Read More>>

Femi Olasupo

My confidence and self-esteem come from a commitment to self-mastery and deep self-knowing. I’ve heard it said that confidence is not walking into a room and thinking you’re better than anyone; it’s walking into the room and not having a need to compare in the first place. For me, that sentiment exemplifies the difference between someone who is seeking external validation and someone who is rooted in internal validation. There will always be people who are younger, smarter, richer, or luckier than you in some aspect of life.  Read More>>

Cayla Spring

I had to relearn how to feel confident—how to trust myself again, step by step. It wasn’t an overnight change but a process of unlearning self-doubt and replacing it with self-acceptance. I started by acknowledging my strengths instead of fixating on my weaknesses, setting small goals, and celebrating even the smallest victories. Read More>>

Tea Bacon

The journey to develop my confidence and self esteem was hard! I used to compare myself to what I see on the internet, and people around me. I’ve been bullied for so long that I used to believe that I was never beautiful like everyone else, and my interests and my personality was weird. I never felt like I could fit in. To be honest, college was my saving grace. I surrounded myself with people who shared the same interests as me and those who were just curious of me as I was to them. Overall, being out of high school really helped me find myself. Read More>>

Julian Thomas

Being a Leo, I jokingly like to say that my confidence is innate. But in reality, it was a skill that needed to developed overtime.
I think what has been the most effective way for me to develop confidence is 1). practice and 2) no overthinking. Read More>>

Zae Vibez

When I decided to really start loving myself, the confidence and self esteem came with it. It all starts with the wanting to see the light in oneself. Which also comes with confronting the question “Am I really investing my time, attention, and energy in way that I’m proud of?” Once started focusing on that then it’s just practice from there on out. Projecting my voice, walking with my head up, working on my presentation, putting myself out there, etc. Those are a lot of the physical actions but mental training comes first . Read More>>

Dawson Sewell

This question is one that I absolutely love. Why? For most of my 17 years of life, I have seen myself either as less than, or even not worthy enough for anything. It was more of a defeated mindset before I even began doing anything. It all truly came from childhood trauma that was detrimental to my growth rate. It even caused me to try and take my own life at six years old, later developing into substance abuse.  Read More>>

Brady Foley

As a photographer it was definitely hard in the beginning to put my work out there for people to see and judge, especially online. I wasn’t super confident with my style or even simple things like editing. At one point I had probably deleted more post than I had even made and wiped all my memory cards because I was convinced a “fresh start” was what I needed. Read More>>

Amol Ramani

I come from a filmmaking background and so I was always used to looking at others through a lens. When it was my turn to act, I was extremely under confident and I never saw myself as fit for the screen. Most of it had to do with how I perceived myself, my insecurities and my seeming flaws. I had two major realizations in my journey that helped overcome these factors and immensely boosted my confidence and self esteem.  Read More>>

Tanique Tucker

I developed my confidence and self esteem by removing toxic and negative people from
my life that was draining me and surrounded myself with the right people which caused a significant impact on my self esteem and confidence for the better. Struggling with Hirsutism since a very young age also caused my self esteem to be very low and depression was something that never went away. Overtime, I managed to uplift myself and make drastic life changes such as starting laser therapy, losing weight and utilizing skincare and makeup to build my confidence. Read More>>

Trace Casanova

Growing up an only child I was raised spoiled so naturally I know I’ll get what I want (haha).

But seriously, I grew up around charismatic folks. My parents are bikers. Mom made a living as a biker-bar bartender for years. I get a lot of my personality from my mother. She’d always support me with any project I took on and let me learn from the mistakes and the success. Read More>>

VINCI XO

I like to think that it was curated over time with new experiences. Being an openly bisexual man in the space that I occupy isn’t always easy, but it’s not about defying what everyone thinks about you. It’s about being totally true to yourself. So I just throw two fingers up and say “F*** ‘EM!”. It’s so easy to get lost in the sauce and be drowned by peoples opinions and the value that others place upon you, but my girlfriend once told me; “You are who you think you are and nobody determines your value but you.” That was very powerful and inspirational to me. Read More>>

Alycia Dantier

I didn’t start off confident. In fact, for most of my childhood and early teen years, I was stuck in a cycle of perfectionism, comparison, and inner criticism. I was the kid who looked “put together” on the outside—turning in assignments on time, making good grades, getting along with teachers. But inside, I constantly questioned my worth. I looked around at other people and thought, What do they have that I don’t? Why do they seem so loved, so confident, so sure of themselves—and I don’t? Read More>>

Charlynn Searcy

I really love this question because I feel that confidence and self esteem is an on going journey for most people, including myself. How I developed my confidence and self esteem was taking baby steps outside my comfort zone. It’s not easy at all, but it is worth it. With anything I do and also what I have learned in therapy, to develop confidence in yourself you have to do the things that scare and challenge you over and over again. Read More>>

Karla Mora

I started building my confidence the moment I realized no one was going to do it for me. As a first-generation, low-income student raised by a single mom, I knew early on that if I wanted something, I had to find a way to make it happen. During my junior year of high school, I opened an Etsy shop to save up for my college application fees. I didn’t have much experience, just determination, and that was enough to get started. Read More>>

Maggie Roscher

I will be honest, when it comes to self esteem I definitely don’t always have it. Social Media is honestly one of the hardest places to have self esteem, you’re constantly comparing yourself to others, and it can really affect how you view yourself. One of the main reason I have self esteem now is I post what I want, without caring about others opinions. I truly love posting cosplays and have so much fun gaming and streaming. As long as you love what you’re doing no one can stop you. Read More>>

 Sandra Riess

I developed my confidence of being on stage in front of people by practicing a lot. I was nervous in the beginning but after doing it lots of times I’m no longer nervous and look forward to performing for people. Read More>>

J Read

I was raised by a single mother who had a healthy dose of pride and self worth. I also often found myself attracted to people who were comfortable in their own skin, whether they were popular, or reclusive. I learned how to get along with a lot of different types of people and personalities from moving around a lot growing up, and coming from a household with seven children. Read More>>

Lynn Chen

Confidence and self-esteem was something I battled a lot with during most of my childhood and young adult life. If you knew me in middle school and high school, you would have known that I was oftentimes depressed and down on myself.

Growing up I had a pretty strict mother and she wanted me to be a stellar student. Many times when I didn’t get a score below an A, she would be very critical of me so I would feel incredibly inadequate. I was always striving to achieve perfection and that didn’t help my confidence because I would ultimately fail to meet her expectations. Read More>>

Mikaela St. Laurent

This is such a good one! Especially now that I work directly with women to develop their own confidence and self-esteem. For me, I think I would say that it started when I felt my most insecure and unhappy in life, which was sometime in high school. Your body changes, your friends change, you enter romantic relationships and that can take a toll on you too. Read More>>

Branden Dobard

It started off from having to deal with not having ANY of it from ages 1-19. But after i commuted to a weight loss journey from 19-20, i had all the confidence in the world to not worry about failure for anything i did. Then i proceeded to fail and fail again until i gained the experience and confidence in the self esteem and things im best at now Read More>>

Safe & Sound The Musical

Holly: Struggling with dyslexia my whole life took a toll on my emotional well-being and mental health. But, I discovered musical theater at a young age and it has been a huge source for my self-esteem, confidence and mental health well-being. Creating a show like Safe & Sound The Musical with Lizzie (aka Elizsabeth) solidified my confidence, and my self-esteem is associated with what I am most confident doing. Read More>>

Joanna Spinks

Honestly, I got confident by acting confident. It’s a beautiful cycle!

In my twenties (circa 2006) I worked at a very cool restaurant in New York City with a pioneering wine list of natural wines. I was the host, working only in proximity to the wine and I was terrified a customer would ask me something about it. I became very interested in it because I feared it so much.  Read More>>

Rosalie Rich

Although I feel like I’m still learning how to be more confident in myself, this is such a relevant question for me right now. When I first moved here about 9 months ago, I had an entry level job lined up on a path to becoming a film editor, but knew I wanted to edit for freelance gigs on the side. Coming out of college, I really didn’t have a lot to show for myself: I had maybe two student films and some promotional clips for a club that I was in, and trying to convince people that I was qualified for a job was hard. Read More>>

Kyanne Bismarck

After two plus decades in the hairdressing industry, I am always asked about how to work on confidence through working with my clients or mentoring other hairdressers and small business owners. Read More>>

Aavyn Lee

I’m very lucky to have grown up in a household that cultivated the idea that I could do or be anything I ever wanted. My mom is a big part of that. I’ve known since I was three that I wanted to be an actor. I grew up around the arts- my mom is a singer- and she always pushed the idea that I had the ability to do anything I dreamed about. Read More>>

SEN – SEI

From a personal point of view, I guess it started with a few factors regarding how/when/where I grew up. First off, I’m a Gen-X, Italian, Puerto Rican Brooklynite. That’s a lot to take in right there. Now, add that I’m an only child from a blue-collar father & an immigrant mother who was in the beauty industry for over 30 years. Read More>>

Kayla Taylor

Confidence and self-esteem didn’t happen overnight for me. It’s been a journey of self-discovery, trial, and learning to embrace who I am at every stage of my life. A big part of it came from personal style. Fashion has always been my creative outlet, and the more I leaned into dressing for me, not trends or other people’s opinions, the more I realized how powerful self-expression is. Read More>>

Rachel Fox

For a long time, I thought confidence came from achievement. From doing more, being more, proving myself—over and over again. I wore it like armor. On the outside, I looked capable and put together. But inside, I was constantly questioning my worth. I wasn’t confident—I was just good at performing. Read More>>

Daniela Pair

I grew up in Quito, Ecuador, a city shaped by the mindset: “Tell me how much you have, and I will tell you who you are.” As part of the upper-middle class, I felt the constant pressure to strive for more, to reach the next level of status. Comparison and criticism were deeply ingrained in the culture, and as a result, I struggled with self-doubt and a lack of confidence from an early age. Read More>>

Kara Vaval

Confidence is one of those things people tend to think you are born with when in reality, it is something you develop over time. Dictionary.com defines confidence as: a feeling of self-assurance arising from one’s appreciation of one’s own abilities and qualities and that is exactly how I developed my confidence and self-esteem. Read More>>

Stefani Faye

I developed my confidence and self-esteem by doing the exact thing that once scared me, stepping outside of my comfort zone and into the unknown. It started during a painful chapter of my life, navigating a divorce and trying to rediscover who I was outside of that relationship. Read More>>

Elise Hill

When I was a teenager, I found myself in an unhealthy relationship that left me feeling small, unheard, and disconnected from who I was. One day, almost instinctively, I walked into a gym—not to change how I looked, but to remember how it felt to be strong. Read More>>

Laura Garner Hine

As a woman navigating the complexities of our modern world, I have faced my fair share of struggles with confidence and self-esteem. Malcolm Gladwell famously stated, “It takes 10,000 hours to become an expert in anything,” and while I may not have reached that milestone yet, I have discovered that the journey itself is just as important as the destination. Read More>>

Jue Vé Jones

I would say my sense of confidence and the way I view myself improved as I matured. I began to trust sharing myself more as I deepened my mind body connection through sensual expression, art and movement. My moving practices like yoga, reiki and dance helped me really sit with all that I am and have experienced. I learned to appreciate the transformative experiences that make me, me. Read More>>

Marcia McMillen

I come from a family rooted in creativity and resilience, originally from Michigan but having lived across the diverse landscapes of the United States. We moved frequently for my dad’s career development, which meant I was often the new kid in school. Read More>>