 Do you struggle with confidence? I know that I did when I first started out as a full-time artist. I'd create some artwork, I'd take it to an art fair or a show and I'd be standing there and of course people are coming, you can hear them commenting on your artwork and sometimes in it's good makes you feel good, right? Your confidence builds but when perhaps you hear people saying, oh no, don't really like that, don't like the use of this, that and the other and of course it's just their opinion, right? But it can really knock your confidence and maybe even stop you from going out and doing more things with your art. And that doesn't change now with the online world of course because you post something on social media and you are open to a whole load of comments underneath and I know that for a lot of people that can be really tricky. You put something out and you say, hey, what do you think about that? And somebody would like to tell you what they think about that and again, it's not always positive and so sometimes we can be left with a really hurt feeling inside. You know, as artists, we're sensitive beings, right? When we put our artwork out for the world to see, we are open to both the positive and the negative. So how do you grow your confidence then with aside from all of that? And then of course there's all those tasks as a business owner too, right? There's making those phone calls, maybe it's a follow up client phone call maybe you need to contact a gallery to ask if they'd like to have your work or what about closing a sale, having that sales conversation with somebody all of these things require you to feel confident, feel good about what you're doing because the moment that's knocked, we know what happens is we stop taking action and when we stop taking action, we're not of course gonna get the results that we want which I guess in your case is building a profitable art business, doing what you love. So in this video, I'm gonna share 10 confidence tips that's gonna enable you to start believing a little bit more in yourself, grow your confidence and enable you to easily do all those out of comfort zone tasks. Well hello and welcome or welcome back to my channel. My name's Sophie and I help artists just like you to set up market and grow a highly successful business of doing what you love. But on this channel I share tips and tricks about all things art business related. So if that's something you're interested don't forget to subscribe to the channel and hit that bell to get notified every time I post a new video. Well okay, let's dive straight into those tips. So my first tip actually is all about your comfort zone. You know what they say when you stay in your comfort zone and you don't grow, right? You just keep doing what you've always done and the only way to grow or to build anything like your confidence is to step outside of your comfort zone. So I would suggest finding something each and every day could be really small that's gonna stretch you and enable you to step outside that comfort zone. It might be one small phone call. It might be posting something that is a little bit more raw and real. It might be having a conversation with a customer and whatever it is, if you just challenge yourself to do that every single day and I promise you your confidence will only grow. So my next tip, tip number two is about positive self-talk. You know how easy it is to tell you what you haven't got done or what you did bad. Inevitably we default to what we didn't do or wasn't good, right? Why is that? Why do we always default to the negative? When actually what you want to be doing is reminding yourself, hey, I've got this. I'm good at this. I can do that. I've done a task similar to that. I've made phone calls lots of times. Phone calls are easy. It would be really easy for me to just pick up that phone call, right? It's just a case of talking. I can talk. I'm good at talking. Whatever it is that you need to do to run that more positive self-talk. And if you start getting that little chatter going along and it's all supportive and it reminds you that actually you've got this, then again, that's really gonna support your confidence to grow. My next tip is about taking it one day at a time. How often do we think about, oh my goodness me, here's all the things I have to do in the next week, in the next month. It can all seem overwhelming. And if you've got things to do that are going to stretch you a bit, they're uncomfortable, things you're putting off, then likely you're actually going to feel worse. And that's not gonna help your confidence, right? So if you just look at what you need to do today, and if you run that self-talk and you break everything down to really simple tasks, we say, okay, next up, I just need to pick up the phone and make a phone call. That's it, just today. I don't have to worry about what's next. With just today, I need to do these three things, all these five things. And you just stay and focus in on what you need to do just on that day. And my next tip is about remembering what's important to you. Our values are really, really important when we're talking about building a sustainable business, designing a dream life, and feeling really good about what we're doing. Right, we're talking about building confidence. So therefore we want to be thinking about what is important to us? The last thing you want to be doing is things that actually don't meet your values. Because when you're not meeting your values, you don't feel so good about it. You're not feeling perhaps in control. Somebody's asked you to do something. It feels a bit uncomfortable. But when we come back to our values and what's important, and we just say yes to the projects that we really want, then that is going to help you feel good about yourself and it's going to help, again, that confidence to build. So my next tip is about using previous positive memories. So for example, let's take that phone call because I know that that comes up so many times. Sophia can't make that phone call to the gallery or I can't follow up with that client who said they were interested in something. So remember a time where you had a really happy phone conversation, of course, it doesn't have to be business related, you could just take yourself back to a memory where you felt really good on the phone and you had a really easy conversation, maybe with a friend or a relative. And when you can hold onto that positive memory, you can remember how good it feels, right? You might even laugh and just say, okay, that was such a great conversation. But if you use that to build your confidence before you make that phone call, then of course it's going to be a lot easier for you. You're going to feel good, you're going to sort of hold it in your body, you're going to smile a lot, that's something else I'm going to talk about in a minute. And then the conversation will go a lot easier, right? And again, with everything that you achieve, your confidence will start to build. My next tip is tackle a small task. Yes, you know when you get that sense of, oh, I did that, that's great. Now if I did that, I can do the next task and the next one. So for example, it could be something as silly as you've come into the studio, it's a bit of a mess. You say, okay, task number one is, I'm going to clear up the studio. So you've done that, you've achieved it. Now you have a sense of like, okay, success. What's the next task? Okay, I'm going to deal with my emails. So I've filed all, I don't know, 100 emails, task success. What about the next small task? Well, I just need to make a follow-up phone call, all right, task are done, achieved, success. And the more that you do it, it's the compound factor of course, the better you're going to feel. So before I share the next few tips, I want to ask you which one so far has resonated with you. Let me know in the comments below where you struggle with the confidence and what tip that I've suggested today you're going to use in order to help you move forwards. So I've shared six so far and we've got just four more to go. Now my next tip for confidence is actually about smiling. And I did this a few years ago and it feels really good. Now, I don't know if you've ever done this before. I've seen this exercise anywhere where you smile in the mirror looking at yourself for one minute, two minutes, five minutes if you can. That seems like a really long period of time. Or you can just smile. You don't have to look at yourself in the mirror, but sometimes it helps, all right. Helps you to stay focused. You want to smile. Now at first you're going to be, that's how to look like something out of a horror movie. But you're just smiling because the act of smiling, it changes your facial expressions, it changes your physiology, it changes what's happening in your brain and you start to feel good, all right. Even if at first you don't think, well, I haven't got anything to smile about. Just smile, make your face into a smile and keep smiling for as long as you possibly can. Let's say somewhere, you know, one, two minutes up to five minutes is perfect. And again, if you do this every day, you start to feel better. When we feel better, we feel more confident to do the things that we need to do. Oh, I think you're going to love the next tip. This is for all of you who love color. Perhaps I should have thought more before shooting this video in this top, but wear bright colors. Now, have you ever gone to a function, a party, or you've gone out and you're either wearing black or gray or navy, something that just kind of blends in. It's really easy to hide in those colors, isn't it? You can go along to something that you don't really want to go to perhaps and you can just blend in, mix and kind of hang around in the background. But turn up in the red dress and everybody is looking at you or the red suit and everybody notices you. And what happens when you're wearing that color very often is again, you can feel good. You put it on and you feel good. So I challenge you, wear some bright colors and notice how you feel. Your confidence will lift instantly. You'll feel really good, especially if you love the item you're wearing. Obviously, don't put on something that you think, I don't feel very good in this, I don't like it. It's got to be that item of clothing that you really love. Wear a bright color and go out in the bright color and see how amazing it makes you feel. So my next tip is linked to one near at the beginning actually but it's really a firm no, saying no to things that really you don't want to do. Now you might say, what has that got to do with confidence Sophie? Again, it's about you staking your claim. It's about you saying, do you know what? Actually, I don't want that project. I don't want to do that thing over there. And by saying no, you're really honoring yourself and you're staying true to yourself. And when you do that, again, it feels good and your confidence will grow. So you've probably noticed a lot of this is about physiology, right? It's very difficult to feel confident if you're sort of hunched and slumped down, you feel a bit like that. But if you sit up or you stand up straight, you put your shoulders back, you're instantly changing your physiology and you feel better. And when you feel better, your confidence lifts, all right? So this next tip is all about acting as if. Now, have you ever done that before? Now, let's take that party scenario. Perhaps we'll look at it and say it's a private view for an exhibition. And maybe it's not your exhibition and you're feeling a little bit uneasy about going, it's not your thing, you've donned the red dress or the red suit and you're like, okay, I've got this, I'm gonna go. And now you're gonna act as if, you're gonna act as if you do this every day. It's a breeze for you to walk in, you're gonna chat to everybody, you're gonna meet the gallery owner, shake his or her hand and you're gonna feel good. You're gonna act as if it's something that's easy and you are that 100% confidence person. Because what's gonna happen when you do that again on an ongoing basis? All of these little tiny things are gonna compound. When you act as if you've achieved something, as if you are that person, as if you are super confident, what's gonna happen? Your body's gonna assume that and then you're gonna actually become that person, you're gonna become that confident person able to go to the private view and feel really good about it, able to make those phone calls to clients, able to post something on social media and really not care about the comments that come beneath it. You know, able to grow your business, do those out of confidence things that you wanna do. When you build your confidence, you're one step closer to the success that you know you deserve and that you know that you really want. So I hope you've enjoyed today's video. If you're not sure which tip is for you maybe just listen back again and decide which is the one that you're going to really work on and then let me know in the comments below. I've got other videos on mindset too, so make sure to check those out. I will link them below this video. So thank you so much for watching and I'll see you on the next one.