Quotes for the Journey: Confidence They are able because they think they are able. Virgil

There can be no great courage where there is no confidence or assurance, and half the battle is in the conviction that we can do what we undertake.        -Orison Swett Marden     Confidence is that feeling by which the mind embarks in great and honorable courses with a sure hope and trust in itself.       -Marcus T. Cicero     I build confidence when I practice a variety of shots - hitting it high or low, working the ball.  A lot of golfers go to the range and just hit full shots. That doesn't build on-course confidence, because you won't always hit full shots out there. My confidence is built on knowing I can effectively work the ball in any circumstance.       -JoAnne Carner     Believe that with your feelings and your work you are taking part in the greatest; the more strongly you cultivate this belief, the more will reality and the world go forth from it.        -Rainer Maria Rilke     Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained.       -Marie Curie      Whatever you are by nature, keep to it; never desert your own line of talent.  Be what nature intended you for, and you will succeed; be anything else and you will be ten thousand times worse than nothing.       -Sydney Smith

It is only a person's own fundamental thoughts that have truth and life in them.  For it is these that he or she really and completely understands.  To read the thoughts of others is like taking the remains of someone else's meal, like putting on the discarded clothes of a stranger.       -Arthur Schopenhauer

Class is an aura of confidence that is being sure without being cocky.  Class has nothing to do with money.  Class never runs scared.  It is self-discipline and self-knowledge.  It's the sure-footedness that comes with having proved you can meet life.        -Ann Landers

I believe that in our constant search for security we can never gain any peace of mind until we secure our own soul.  And this I do believe above all, especially in my times of greatest discouragement, that I must believe--that I must believe in my fellow people--that I must believe in myself--that I must believe in God--if life is to have any meaning.        -Margaret Chase Smith

Nobody holds a good opinion of a person who has a low opinion of him or herself.        -Anthony Trollope

If one burdens the future with one's worries, it cannot grow organically.  I am filled with confidence, not that I shall succeed in worldly things, but that even when things go badly for me I shall still find life good and worth living.       -Etty Hillesum

Self-distrust is the cause of most of our failures. . . they are the weakest, however strong, who have no faith in themselves or their own powers. Christian Bovee Nothing splendid has ever been achieved except by those who dared believe that something inside them was superior to circumstances. Bruce Barton

The confidence which we have in ourselves gives birth to much of that which we have in others.       -La Rochefoucauld

Be like the bird That, pausing in her flight Awhile on boughs too slight, Feels them give way Beneath her and yet sings, Knowing that she hath wings. Victor Hugo

What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people think.  This rule, equally arduous in actual and intellectual life, may serve for the whole distinction between greatness and meanness.  It is the harder, because you will always find those who think they know what is your duty better than you know it.  It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great person is one who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.        -Ralph Waldo Emerson

Confidence . . . thrives on honesty, on honor, on the sacredness of obligations, on faithful protection and on unselfish performance.  Without them it cannot live.        -Franklin D. Roosevelt

Underlying the whole scheme of civilization is the confidence people have in each other, confidence in their integrity, confidence in their honesty, confidence in their future.       -W. Bourke Cockran

Our belief at the beginning of a doubtful undertaking is the one thing that insures the successful outcome of our venture.       -William James

Faith is a living, daring confidence in God's grace, so sure and certain that a person would stake his or her life on it a thousand times. This confidence in God's grace and knowledge of it makes people glad and bold and happy in dealing with God and with all his creatures; and this is the work of the Holy Ghost in faith. Hence a person is ready and glad, without compulsion, to do good to everyone, to serve everyone, to suffer everything, in love and praise of God, who has shown him or her this grace.       -Martin Luther

Kill the snake of doubt in your soul, crush the worms of fear in your heart and mountains will move out of your way.        -Kate Seredy

If you doubt you can accomplish something, then you can't accomplish it.  You have to have confidence in your ability, and then be tough enough to follow through.       -Rosalynn Carter

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our Light, not our Darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you NOT to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightening about shrinking so that other people won't feel unsure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone. As we let our own Light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others. Marianne Williamson (often attributed to Nelson Mandela,  who used it in his 1994 inaugural address)

I am somebody.  I am me.  I like being me.  And I need nobody to make me somebody.      - Louis L'Amour

Every great discovery I ever made, I gambled that the truth was there, and then I acted in faith until I could prove its existence.       - Arthur H. Compton

People are timid and apologetic; they are no longer upright; they dare not say "I think," "I am," but quotes some saint or sage.  They are ashamed before the blade of grass or the blowing rose.  These roses under my window  make no reference to former roses or to better ones; they are for what they are; they exist with God to-day.       -Ralph Waldo Emerson

Calm self-confidence is as far from conceit as  the desire to earn a decent living is remote from greed.      -Channing Pollock

Confidence is that feeling by which the mind embarks on great and honorable courses with a sure hope and trust in itself.       -Cicero

There is overwhelming evidence that the higher the level of self-esteem, the more likely one will treat others with respect, kindness, and generosity.  People who do not experience self-love have little or no capacity to love others.       -Nathaniel Branden

Only the person who has faith in him or herself is able to be faithful to others.       -Erich Fromm

Experience tells you what to do; confidence allows you to do it.       -Stan Smith

People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are.  The people who get on in this world are they who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can't find them, make them.       -George Bernard Shaw

Twelve Rules for Building Self-Confidence 1.  Focus on your potential instead of your limitations. 2.  Determine to know the truth about yourself. 3.  Distinguish between who you are and what you do. 4.  Find something you like to do and do well, then do it over and over. 5.  Replace self-criticism with regular, positive self-talk. 6.  Replace fear of failure with clear pictures of yourself functioning successfully and happily. 7.  Dare to be a little eccentric. 8.  Make the best possible peace with your parents. 9.  Determine to integrate the body and spirit. 10.  Determine to live above neurotic guilt. 11.  Cultivate people who help you grow. 12.  Refuse to allow rejection to keep you from taking the initiative with people. Alan Loy McGinnis

The way in which we think of ourselves has everything  to do with how our world sees us.      -Arlene Raven

Never grow a wishbone, daughter, where your backbone ought to be.       -Clementine Paddleford

Learn to depend upon yourself by doing things in accordance with your own way of thinking.       -Grenville Kleiser

I've never met a person, I don't care what his or her condition, in whom I could not see possibilities. I don't care how much people may consider themselves failures, I believe in them, for they can change the thing that is wrong in their lives anytime they are prepared and ready to do it.  Whenever they develop the desire, they can take away from their lives the things that are defeating them. The capacity for reformation and change lies within.        -Preston Bradley

Search and you will find that at the base and birth of every great business organization was an enthusiast, a person consumed with earnestness of purpose, with confidence in his or her powers, with faith in the worthwhileness of his or her endeavors.       -B.C. Forbes

One can inspire a group of others only if one oneself is filled with confidence and hope of success.       -Floyd V. Filson

Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement.  Nothing can be done without hope and confidence.      -Helen Keller

If one burdens the future with one’s worries, it cannot grow organically.  I am filled with confidence, not that I shall succeed in worldly things, but that even when things go badly for me I shall still find life good and worth living.       -Etty Hillesum

Hold up your head!  You were not made for failure, you were made for victory; go forward with a joyful confidence in that result sooner or later, and the sooner or later depends mainly on yourself.       -Anne Gilchrist

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have "perfect" confidence in yourself and your abilities?  Complete confidence that allowed you to know that you could do whatever you needed to do? I wonder that often, for it must be a great feeling.  I'm not that far from it, though, and I know that one of the greatest strides I've ever taken in developing confidence in myself has had to do with accepting two things:  I'm good at what I do well, and there are certain things that I don't do well at all. It used to be that I never gave myself credit for being able to do what I did well. I would compare myself to others who did things much better than I, never allowing myself to admit that they had had a lot more experience at whatever it was than I had. At times I was even hyper-critical of myself, a trait that proved to be nothing but destructive. But I know now that there are plenty of things that I do very well. I may not be the best at what I do, but I am very good at some particular things, and I give myself credit for that, and I always try to improve my skills.  I can write, I can build things, I can develop a website, and I can do those things well. Those things I can't do well--play the guitar and sing, for example, I do for fun now, not to try to excel. We live in a culture that overvalues the concept of excelling.  Many people lose confidence in themselves not because they're not able to do things well, but because they're not able to excel.  One student of mine once told me that she didn't have any confidence in her writing because the papers that she read by the other students were so much better than hers. What she didn't realize was that she was sitting next to one of the best writers I've ever seen in a college composition course, and she always read this student's papers first. The student who didn't have confidence in her writing was also a very good writer--by far the second-best in the class--but she had lost confidence because she was comparing herself to a much better writer. There's nothing wrong with trying to excel. But if your best isn't as good as someone else's, don't allow yourself to lose confidence--either work harder to reach a new best, or accept that that's the way things are, as long as you're giving your all.  The line from the "Desiderata" says it all:  "You are a child of the universe; no less than the trees and the stars, you have a right to be here." Accepting this idea as truth should give you all the confidence you need. As I said earlier, I'm not too far from complete confidence, and that confidence comes from knowing my strengths and weaknesses and accepting them. I also know I'm not in anything alone--I have friends and family and God behind me, no matter what I do, and with that kind of support, why wouldn't I be confident? tom walsh

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