Is Confidence Overrated?
A few days ago, I read the comments of this post on The F Word, discussing the idea that “every woman is beautiful.” This comment from Meerkat has really stuck with me since I read it.
Unless she is not confident, because those people are hideous even if they are supermodels! Or so I have been told by very many well-meaning people. (Sorry, that was a bit derailish. Venting from the time I tried to get someone to rephrase “confidence makes you 1000x more beautiful” to “confidence helps people see your beauty” so that I wouldn’t have to conclude that I am hopelessly ugly, and she was all, “NO! Confidence is vital to beauty!” So remember, kids, the thing to tell people who are insecure about their looks is that their insecurity makes them disgusting.)
I’ve advocated confidence myself, plenty of times. (Just check out the “related posts” links for evidence.) It feels like in my own life, confidence has been an asset to me. But this is such an interesting angle from which to look at the idea of confidence. What if you’re not confident? Does that make you a failure? Are we oppressing people by suggesting that they “should” become more confident?
Also, saying that “every woman is beautiful” made me think of Lesley’s recent piece on appearance-based privilege, wherein she suggests that perhaps we don’t need to feel beautiful or even believe we’re beautiful to have fulfilling lives:
[F]or me, there was tremendous freedom in surrendering the idea that subjectively feeling — if not objectively being — beautiful was a requirement of a happy and fulfilling life. This is not to suggest that people shouldn’t feel good about themselves, or even “pretty”, as the occasion warrants — my point is that this feeling should not be the necessity and the compulsion that it is, and that when it occurs, it should neither be underscored nor negated by the response of the majority, according to what masculine doctrine finds most valuable. Wanting to feel pretty, to appreciate and value oneself as a beautiful person, is a fine notion. Confronting, deconstructing, and redefining what counts as beauty is a valiant effort. But we should also be vigilant: is it personal gratification and self-love we’re after, or the advantages that being beautiful to others would afford us?
So, what do you guys think about confidence? Is it okay if we don’t have it?
Posted by mo pie
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That is such an interesting take on confidence. I’ve been a huge advocate of it myself, believing that feeling good and confident in yourself is important, not just for the sake of “beauty” but in so many other ways. I’ve never thought of it the way it was presented here. I don’t think by not being confident a person is a failure or can’t be beautiful but I can see for someone who lacks that confidence how it could feel that way. As always, I appreciate when my thoughts are challenged and will keep that in mind next time I engage in a discussion on confidence.
There’s a difference between being confident about your looks, and being confident about other stuff, like your sense of humor, your intelligence, your desirability, etc. To me, telling someone to be confident about her looks is the same thing as telling someone she should love and accept her body the way it is. Which is what FA is all about, in my opinion.
Yes. Perhaps in this case, confidence means being assured that you are worthy of love and respect no matter what you look like.
People who secretly believe they are unlovable sometimes engage in off-putting interpersonal behavior. Maybe this is why confidence is so valued. It’s one of the few indicators that someone might be somewhat secure on the inside, and therefor treat you well once you’re close to them.
That second part reminds me a lot of the trope about bullies just secretly being really insecure inside, which I am pretty sure was debunked.
I don’t like the implication that my lack of confidence makes me act horribly toward my friends and I think most of them would not agree that it does.
I don’t think people who lack confidence are all “horrible” to their friends, by any means. In fact, I haven’t noticed a correlation between how nice people are and how confident they are, at all.
I do think it’s true that a lack of confidence *can* prompt people to engage in some problematic social behaviors, because this is something I personally struggle with. I’m shy and self-conscious, and I sometimes become withdrawn as a result. Definitely something I’m trying to work on…
I didn’t aim that comment at you personally. I have known some people like this, and I know that some of my own worst behavour comes from insecurity, so that’s where my observations came from.
For me, it’s like a vicious cycle. Lack of confidence leads me to isolate myself, which means that my friendships suffer.. Then I feel lonely and rejected, which makes my confidence drops even lower. And so on, until I’m spending weekends alone in my room, watching dramas on hulu and crying.
Or at least, that’s how I spent most of my senior year of college.
Not much fun. :-(
Maybe this is splitting hairs, but that’s not what I find objectionable. What I object to is anything that implies that people who are not confident cannot be beautiful, because then you get into “You should believe that you are beautiful but since you don’t you are ugly,” which boils down to “You are ugly.”
I have a bigger problem with the connotations attached to “beautiful” and “ugly” than with the words themselves.
“You are ugly” should really mean no more than “you don’t conform to what I – and the wider society – finds attractive”. What it tends to mean is “you are unworthy and a lesser person, even though it may not be your fault”.
I have always thought that Confidence was crucial to beauty, but only because confidence gets you noticed.
The difference that confidence makes is not between beauty and ugliness but between being seen and being invisible.
Most people who have no confidence don’t really want people looking at them anyway (I know when my confidence is low I want to be invisible) so I can’t really see how it’s a bad thing.
But then again, maybe that’s a form of privilege talking… I always seem to get the level of attention I want, based on my mood. Maybe I’m just lucky that way?
The same outfit, hairstyle, etc, can go from “Morticia the Eye-Magnet” to “did that shadow move? ” in a flash based on my mood and the way I move…
That is probably a lot more true than the media has led me to believe. (I know the media tells me that women who are *really* beautiful look fabulous no matter what, but perhaps in real life who gets noticed has more to do with who dresses up, or some other social signals that I can’t even follow.) Even so, I hate sound bytes about how confidence = beauty because we have so much of the concept that being beautiful is basically the whole point of existing as a woman. So unless it’s coming from someone who I already know is a *raging* feminist (and then why would they be giving beauty tips?) I tend to interpret it as “confidence = not failure as a woman.”
Woops, I think I implied that feminists can’t care about beauty. There is nothing anti-feminist about “Let me share technique A which produces result B” just because it involves eyeliner. But “Attribute A is universally attractive and attribute B is universally unattractive,” not so awesome (unless maybe lack of confidence is just as bad as being a total asshole, which I am not convinced is universally unattractive anyway).
Thanks for this post! I am not a very confident person (although I am working on that) and when people say things about having to be confident, it makes me feel worse. People also give the advice “Fake it” when it comes to being confident, but first of all I can’t, second of all, I don’t want to pretend to be something I’m not to gain approval.
This is exactly how I feel.
It’s not so much that they want you to fake being confident. It’s that they want you to fake being an extrovert. That’s really what confident means in many peoples’ minds.
I can pretend to be an extrovert for the duration of a job interview but not longer than that.
I dunno, it worked for me. Really. In high school I had dreadful self esteem and confidence. But I acted the part (I was a drama geek, after all), and people perceived me as very confident, and treatment me like I was, and it formed a positive feedback loop so that I slowly became more confident.
Mind, that had its own problems in college, when I started acting like a raging egomaniac, and I had to learn to dial that performance back down.
But acting confident when you don’t feel it really can help to engender confidence.
Sorry, that sounded as if I was telling you you should do it. I don’t mean that. If you can’t and don’t want to play the role, you can’t and don’t want to, and that’s fine. It’s only one possible way to build confidence. But that method (used correctly) isn’t really about pretending confidence to gain approval, it’s about pretending confidence in order to gain real confidence.
The other way of gaining confidence that’s worked for me is to go and get really competent at something, so that I know I’m good at it, so I have one thing I’m confident about, and let it spread outward from there.
Not being confident doesn’t make you a failure. What it does is put you at risk and make you dependent on those around you. If you aren’t confident in your own ability to drive a car, or make financial decisions, or run your own life, or hold down a job, you end up relying on the people around you. And relying on the people around you can put you at risk for abuse or at the very least for not leading a fulfilling life
I think there is also a difference from APPEARING confident and being confident. Some people are very good at appearing very self assured, but at heart they are not, they are afraid. Now it may be that those people have more privilege than individuals who are less willing to throw their weight around, but what is important is that all of those people are willing to go to bat for themselves, and rely on themselves.
I actually worry all the time about my youngest cousin, she seems to lack confidence in her ability to do anything outside of her comfort zone. And I think this puts her at risk for abuse, and for not leading a fulfilling life because she doesn’t believe she CAN.
Beauty is only skin deep, and while people judge us based on our looks, it doesn’t affect our life choices quite as deeply as confidence. If you didn’t think you could walk up a flight of stairs, would you? Confidence is important.
I don’t think anyone is saying confidence isn’t important. What I am trying to say is, telling people how doomed they are for not being confident doesn’t help them be more confident. (Also, depending on other people is kind of inevitable for many people, to a greater or lesser extent depending on their circumstances.)
When people say “confidence makes you beautiful” most of the time it isn’t meant as actual “beauty” but that it makes you more approachable. Confidence makes you more comfortable with yourself and happier, which makes people want to be around you.
Yes. Perhaps instead of “confidence makes you beautiful” it should be “confidents makes you charming.”
I’d like to think I’m confident enough to realize I am not physically beautiful in a standard or conventional sense, but that is OK. Which is why I react very negatively to fake compliments I suppose!
“I’d like to think I’m confident enough to realize I am not physically beautiful in a standard or conventional sense, but that is OK.”
This is so incredibly awesome. I’d like to think I’m getting there too!
For me, confidence is a logical result of self-love. It has a lot less to do with how others see us than it does with how we see ourselves. And like so many other emotions, it waxes and wanes.
So rather than worrying about whether we are confident enough (“Enough for whom?” I’d ask), it seems to me that it’s much more important to be as kind to ourselves as we can be, whether we fit somebody else’s norm or not.
That makes sense to me. I am not going to start in on self-kindness because this thread isn’t really about psychoanalyzing me.
Wow, my being grouchy in comments has finally made me famous!
Anyway, I think people say that about confidence and beauty a lot because they want to reassure people who don’t consider themselves physically beautiful that they can get the advantages of beauty from something they can change rather than something they can’t. After all, anyone can just be more confident, right? No. That is why it fails.
I think confidence, like most things, is good in moderation. If you’re too confident then you might end up being a narcissist, if you have too low self-esteem you might end up self-harming in some way physically, or psychologically.
So I guess you have to find your balance. I think just being able to smile and go up and say hi to someone shows a reasonable amount of confidence to most people. I still act sort of stupid around good looking guys though, but what girl doesn’t.
I’m kind of wondering now if Katy Perry tripped over her words when she first met Russell Brand, wouldn’t that be so cute! Yeah, I’m kind of starting to think of Katy being like Anime cute, which I think is kind of what she’s going for.
I completely agree, except with “have to” (find your balance). Of course it would be better to find it, but what if I can’t? Is there a fine? Nobody seems to know how I can do this, although I have been made thoroughly aware that it is urgently vital.
Perhaps I should’ve said, as long as your confidence doesn’t bring major trouble to anyone else. Like, with Hitler. Yes I know, I just Godwin Lawed! :P
THIS is exactly what I always hated about the “have confidence in yourself!” meme though I could never quite put my finger on what exactly it was that irked me so damn much about hearing it all the friggin’ time. I knew it was to make me feel better about myself, and I loved my girlfriends for wanting to do that for me, but it became increasingly frustrating for me to hear it, because no matter what I did, it didn’t seem I could be confident either. So not only was I fat and plain looking, I was defective in terms of confidence too. I was doomed!
This is what I have come to dub the “Dr. Phil solutions” attitude. You have some complex emotional thing to work through, and people give you two word, or one sentence short answers for it and expecting you to magically get better overnight. It’s practically like telling a kid who failed a test to just “stop being wrong” instead of teaching him/her what was wrong in the first place. Not only is it not really a help, it can be further frustrating. Not only are you wrong, you’re wrong after they told you the solution to your problems! Not only are you wrong, but you cannot follow directions either.
Again, I understand this is out of love, but I wish there was something better we could move on to instead.
Ha ha, yes! I hate Dr. Phil.
Another word that does not mean what we think it means. Is it important to feel that we can rely on ourselves? Probably, to be an effective adult. Does it have anything to do with appearance, no, not really.
What does Merriam say?
Definition of CONFIDENCE:
1
a : a feeling or consciousness of one’s powers or of reliance on one’s circumstances
b : faith or belief that one will act in a right, proper, or effective way
2
: the quality or state of being certain : certitude
Well, knowing pi to fifty digits/being an excellent cook/insert other achievement here has nothing to do with beauty either, but some people find it sexy. The difference is that confidence is allegedly universally sexy (through its indirect effect on appearance via behavior, attitude, facial expression, etc.)
I actually said appearance, not beauty. Just as “sexy” is also unrelated to appearance, as your point about notes.
Oh, you’re right. I was thinking of beauty as being a quality of appearance (which it is often treated as) but it’s really more a judgment about appearance… or something like that that I could hopefully phrase more clearly if I wasn’t so tired right now.
My name is Theresa Ruth Howard and I have just launched a video blog about body image and I would love for you to check it out and if you like it spread the word it is really about trying to get people to learn to accept and appreciate themselves and their bodies regardless of the form they take. it has a great deal of information and I hope that is will be a place where people feel can come enter an honest dialogue. Shout us out if you like us!!!
http://mybodymyimage.com
thanks!
keep up the great work!
Theresa
I’ve got several comments.
First, I like your point about the implication in “Confidence is vital to beauty” that 1) you’re ugly and 2) it’s your own fault for not being confident. Seems like another form of victim blaming. Perhaps the thing to be concerned about is not our lack of confidence, but the body-hating, fat-hating society that does so much to undermine confidence, or dole it out to a small privileged group or young, thin, able-bodied people. Which, by the way, does not make us ugly.
Assuming that confidence is a good thing, ie nice gift to give ourselves, I think that, like a lot of other self-care actions and thoughts, it can paradoxically turn into another reason to judge ourselves negatively. Put simply, we beat ourselves up for beating ourselves up.
And then, as a lot of other people have pointed out here, there’s the question about beauty as a primary source, or the only source, of confidence. I had a friend once who became concerned that the parents of her three-year-old niece seemed to be constantly praising the little girl’s looks. Their comments were positive, which was a good thing, but they were also teaching the child that self-esteem was all about looks. So my friend made a point of praising her niece for other qualities: “You’re smart,” “You’re funny,” etc. Like the little girl, I sometimes need to hear that I look good, but mostly I need to hear a variety of things about me that are good. So I make a point of talking to myself that way whenever I can.
I think you’re completely right.
We’re just talking about confidence related to looks, right? I always think of that kind of confidence as a sort of delightful magic trick: if you behave as though your looks are special and beautiful, people go, “Well, she must feel that way for a reason,” and they go along with it! Now, a few of them will conclude that you’re not attractive, just delusional. But many will say, “Well maybe it’s me, maybe I’m just not looking at her the right way,” which kind of blows my mind, that people’s notions of beauty are so pliable.
On the other hand, I know plenty of women who are gorgeous but think they’re ugly due to some physical attribute that falls outside the norm. So it’s definitely possible to be beautiful but not confident.
Thanks for bringing this up, meerkat and Mo! I definitely agree – for a lot of folks who are just having a ‘meh’ day, being reminded that they can use their confidence to improve things is truly helpful. But when my problem is a lack of confidence *overall*, rather than a lack of confidence in the moment, telling me that confidence is Super Awesome is just a reminder that I lack said Super Awesomeness.
I also agree with Rubiatonta, that “confident enough for whom?” is a very relevant question. Advice about how you can improve a situation by doing X is often tricky for me. It may come from a caring place, but if I was venting and not looking for suggestions, it can come across as ‘change this aspect of yourself in order to make me more comfortable.’ I call it the ‘buck up, camper’ school of thought, and it’s always made me a bit bristly.
The reason I think confidence can be particularly attractive is because it CAN indicate that a person finds contentment in her own perception of herself – outside the need for public corroboration. This can make us question what we find “beautiful” — and also draw attention to how arbitrary such delineations based on physical appearance can be.
to answer the title question-is confidence over rated? well, I kinda think no, having it is really helpful. Will it inherently make you beautiful? no. Does it need to? no. I do like the idea someone mentioned about being confident about other things enough to just move past the physical. thinking you’re a worthwhile individual is a good thing. That doesn’t need to be related to beauty at all. but our culture fails to realize that.
I think that confidence is very important however attractive or unattractive we are. We can be confident and realise that we are not ‘beautiful’. There are many ways of being confident, and of being, and having an inner confidence about ourselves won’t necessarily let people see our ‘beauty’ but it sure as hell can help you have an easier, more successful life. I don’t think you have to be beautiful to have a fulfilling life but without confidence your self-esteem is on the floor and that is no way to live. So, to me, confidence is essential and whether I am beautiful or not I am going to tell myself every single day that ‘I am a strong and confident woman’, believe it, and have a great time feeling it.
“Every woman is beautiful.” As someone who works with words, this annoys me. To say, “every woman is beautiful” is silly since (1) it’s not true, and (2) it makes the word “beautiful” meaningless.
Some women (thin or fat) are beautiful. Most are not. Just like some women are really really smart, but most are not. Accepting yourself is one thing, being delusional is another. (I myself am not beautiful, and I’m okay with that.)
Late to the game, here. Many years ago, in college, I had a particularly intimidating professor tell me, impatiently, “Your only problem is you aren’t confident! It’s so frustrating!”
I wanted to smack her. Or at least whine, “Yeah, thanks for that, now tell me something I don’t know.”
It wasn’t about beauty. It was about the degree to which I was (or more properly wasn’t) achieving in science, the extent to which I was (not) putting forward ideas for lab experiments, papers, and so on. But telling me that my insecurity was noticeable didn’t magically make me happy and secure – it just made me even more self-conscious.
Ultimately, the only thing that’s ever helped me with the self-consciousness/confidence thing is the ole “Fake it till you make it” approach. After I had a few papers (speeches, experiments, patients) under my belt, I had the true, unthought confidence of experience on my side, but until then I really did have to pretend to be what I wanted to be.
I am not wholly clear how this intersects with beauty, though.
I believe confidence should be for yourself. Not for what other people think of you, or how other people see you, but because it makes you feel good and it makes navigating ones path through life so much easier. I know that when I feel confident, I can face things that I really struggle with when my confidence is low. When I feel confident, I feel beautiful. I don’t care whether or not other people think I’m beautiful in those moments, I just feel it. For ME.