Have you ever wanted to know how to build confidence? Maybe you’ve tried following traditional confidence advice, only to find it didn’t help or that you just weren’t able to follow it. You’re not alone. There are millions of people giving advice on how to be more confident, from “fake it till you make it,” to “get out of your comfort zone,” to “stop comparing yourself to others.” While some of that can help, much of the standard advice is hard for anyone with a mental illness to follow, and sometimes, it can do more harm than good.
If you live with a mental health condition like anxiety, ADHD, depression, or bipolar disorder, it doesn’t just affect your well-being. It affects your confidence. Mental illness can make you feel insecure or afraid to do the things you really want to do. And when people tell you to “just be more confident,” you might think, Okay, but how?
Most advice on building self-confidence goes something like this: take action even if you’re scared. If you fail, try again. The idea is that confidence comes from practice and experience. And many will tell you that every confident person has had to push through fear to gain their confidence.
But if that’s true, why do some people seem to ooze confidence without ever struggling for it? Why does it seem so easy for them, and so hard for you?
Confidence means different things to different people. Some people think confidence is tied to a specific skill or ability, like feeling confident at your job or at the gym. For others, confidence is more like a personality trait. You’re either confident or you’re not.
People with mental illness usually feel confident in familiar, safe situations, but lose that confidence whenever they face anything new or uncertain. And they may not see themselves as a “confident person” at all.
Building confidence when you have a mental illness is absolutely possible. You just need a different approach. If that sounds like you, here are 7 rules for developing unbreakable confidence when you have a mental illness.
1. Be More You, Not Less
People will tell you to fake it till you make it, and there are times when that makes sense. But, if you want to be authentically confident, this is terrible advice. This advice can create stress and anxiety for people with mental health issues. Sure, sometimes it makes sense. If you’re unsure of how to do something, you might have to fake confidence or bluff your skills a bit to get your foot in the door. But you never want to fake your personality or who you are for any reason.
Faking who you are will only make anxiety worse. You’ll spend all your time worrying about when you’ll be “found out.” Sometimes people call this imposter syndrome. And, while it’s normal to feel insecure about your skills, you should never feel like a fake person.
True self-confidence comes from getting good with who you are. The more comfortable you are with yourself, the more confident you’ll feel. If you aren’t being real, you will always feel like everyone likes the fake version of you, and that will quietly eat away at your confidence.
When you’re comfortable in your own skin, people can see it. The best way to be more confident is to be authentically you – not the version you think the world wants to see. Authentic confidence isn’t about pretending to be someone you’re not. It’s about being more you, not less.
2. Never Apologize for Being You
When you have a mental illness, this can mean having panic attacks, crying more easily,or having manic episodes where you say or do things that later embarrass you. I am all about learning how to manage your emotions, handle anxiety, and calm down your mania. But the truth is, when you have a mental illness, these moments may still happen.
I could tell you it will all get better if you take your meds more consistently, or if you use every coping strategy perfectly, but the truth is, you’re going to lose control of your emotions now and then. You will probably have some episodes of hypomania or depression, even when your illness is well-managed.
The best way to feel confident in spite of your mental illness is to accept that part of you. And here’s the truth: even people who don’t have a mental illness can have moments where they don’t act the way they’d like. Like you, they can have moments when they’re too sensitive, or too emotional, and they can have anxiety too. These feelings are part of the human condition. We just might experience them more often, longer, or more intensely. But other people experience these feelings too. Don’t let them fool you into thinking otherwise.
We get in the habit of hiding our flaws or only showing the world our good side – the version of us that we like. We don’t want people to see our high emotions or know we have a mental illness. But hiding our true selves from others doesn’t make us feel more confident; it makes us feel less. Authenticity leads to confidence.
Other people may have an easier time managing their emotions, but that doesn’t make you any less amazing. You don’t need to apologize for your illness or your emotions. You’re ability to be unapologetically yourself in spite of your illness will make you more confident. People often admire and respect authenticity.
It is incredibly hard to be unapologetically confident, and even harder when you have a mental illness. So, know this. You have nothing to apologize and the more you embrace your imperfections, the more confident you become.
3. Get Good with Your Decisions and Mistakes
My dad used to say No decision, no mistake. In other words, the only way to avoid a mistake is not to make a decision. When you have a mental illness, you can start to second-guess every decision you make. Is this a good decision or am I just manic? Maybe this isn’t the right thing. Maybe I am remembering wrong. Maybe I am just overthinking? Anxiety makes you doubt yourself, and that can make even small decisions difficult.
On top of this, a lot of us have the habit of consulting everyone else. What do you think? And the moment we do, our confidence starts to wobble. Something we felt good about suddenly feels uncertain.
What if they come back to you later with an “I told you so”? You need to be comfortable with “I told you so’s.” You can’t gain confidence by relying on other people to make your decisions for you. And, you can’t learn how to make good decisions without making them yourself.
What if the person making you doubt is wrong? It’s okay to get feedback on decisions, but ultimately it’s on you. If you let others decide your life, you’ll end up living their version of it, not yours.
If you want to know how to build confidence, you cannot do it without making mistakes. This is how you learn, grow, and get better. So, even if you struggle with anxiety, depression, or mania, start working on getting good with your decisions and your mistakes. That’s how you build confidence that lasts.
4. Be prepared
I can’t tell you how many times someone has told me, “You’re overthinking,” and I’ve thought to myself, No, I’m not. A lot of people mistake overthinking for being underprepared. They assume if you wobble back and forth on something, it’s because you’re overthinking. I definitely overthink sometimes, but more often, my issue isn’t overthinking — it’s that I am not prepared.
Think about it. Have you ever had to public speak or go to a job interview? When you’re prepared and have practiced what you might say or thought through possible questions, you sound more confident. But if you show up with no idea what you’re going to say, you’ll come across as unprepared and less confident.
If you want to feel more confident, remember that practice builds confidence. Preparation doesn’t just help your performance; it helps your mental health. When you go into something ready, you’re more likely to handle situations better and to walk away feeling confident, even if it doesn’t go well. Even if things don’t go perfectly, you’ll walk away knowing you were prepared and did your best. That alone boosts confidence.
Being prepared is one of the best ways to quiet your overthinking and show up with more confidence — even with a mental health condition. Plus, when you go into something prepared, you don’t walk out feeling depressed, doubting yourself or being fearful to try again. You’re more likely to feel like I did my best, and I feel good about that.
5. Get the Skills
Here’s the thing. In order to feel more confident, you need to know what you’re doing. You can’t feel confident about something you haven’t learned yet. When you get the skills and get good at it, you naturally start to feel more confident.
Everyone should have something they feel competent in — even if it’s something simple like making the best apple pie. You gain confidence from competence. When you feel like a bumbling idiot who has no idea what they’re doing, it’s going to show. And when you have a mental illness, you will feel more self-conscious about it. It may make you feel depressed or like you just don’t have the confidence to do something like that.
The truth is, everyone sucks at something in the beginning. That’s how learning works. You have to suck at it to get better at it. But for those of us with mental health struggles, “sucking at it” can hit harder. It can lead to increased anxiety and depression, even if you know that getting on the other side of it will make you more confident.
So instead of “do it scared” or “do it messy,” try doing it in baby steps. Find people who will help you learn without making you feel stupid or ashamed. If that’s not possible, remind yourself that you don’t suck. Learning takes time and acceptance. You don’t have to be perfect. You don’t even have to be confident (YET). You just have to be willing to learn. Because the more skilled you become, the more confident you’ll feel. Get the skills, and you will get the confidence.
6. Know Yourself
People will tell you that you have to conquer every fear or anxiety, but sometimes that advice just doesn’t work. Trying to do something you know you’re not ready for or that you know will affect your mental health is not the best way to gain confidence. Sometimes pushing yourself into something you’re not ready for doesn’t build confidence. It destroys it.
Have you ever taken on a new job or challenge, knowing it would give you anxiety but convincing yourself it would help you grow, only to hate every second of it once you started? When you have a mental illness, you still want to have goals and to challenge yourself like everyone else. You want to push yourself, but when you try, it goes horribly wrong. You hate the entire experience and wish you had listened to your inner voice.
This not only creates a bad experience. It may make you afraid to try again. This is what I am talking about. You don’t need someone to shove you off the diving board when you’re terrified of water. You don’t need to take a sales job when you already know it’s going to wreck your mental health.
This is not to say you should avoid all challenges when you have a mental illness, but you should know yourself, what you’re ready for, and also what actions might affect your mental illness. You do need to take actions to become more confident, but you don’t have to go completely out of your comfort zone. You can take things slowly and at your own pace. I know they say life begins at the end of your comfort zone, but if you have a mental illness, your mental health may not agree.
Leaving your comfort zone too fast can trigger major anxiety or even destabilize you. So when you make decisions, listen to your inner voice. If something feels like too much right now, it’s okay to wait or take smaller steps. Emotional stability builds real confidence, and repeatedly forcing yourself into situations that make you feel like a failure only tears it down. So, know yourself, what you’re ready for, and go slow with big changes.
At the same time, that same inner knowing can help guide you into healthy challenges. You might think, “This is going to be hard, but I know I can do it. I’ve gotten through worse.” Only you know which things will strengthen you and which things might throw you off balance. Don’t let other people push you past what you’re ready for. True confidence comes from knowing yourself and trusting yourself.
7. Take Care of Yourself
A lot of confidence advice says, “Take care of your body,” but then quickly adds, “It’s not about how you look.” I disagree — at least partly. Because when you look better, you do feel better.
Fixing your hair, putting on makeup, or wearing clothes that make you feel good is a form of self-love. The same goes for exercising, eating better, or getting enough sleep. These things aren’t about vanity — they’re about valuing yourself. When you value yourself by taking care of your body, you’re sending a powerful message to your mind that you matter. And that message builds confidence from the inside out.
Of course, confidence doesn’t come from looks alone. There are plenty of people who don’t fit society’s idea of “beautiful” who still radiate confidence. But when you feel your best physically, it shows in how you carry yourself.
Think about how good you feel after a great workout, a relaxing bath, or a full night’s sleep. You feel accomplished and have more energy. That energy naturally spills into your confidence. When you take care of yourself, you automatically feel better — and that feeling gives you more confidence.
How to Build Confidence: Follow these rules
I hope my tips on how to build confidence have helped you. Building confidence can be more challenging when you have a mental illness, but it’s absolutely possible. If you want to live a more confident life, it starts with being yourself and learning to love yourself more. The better you get at being you, the more confident you’ll become.
If traditional confidence advice hasn’t worked for you, try these seven rules. If traditional confidence advice hasn’t worked for you, try these seven rules. They’re honest, simple, and built for people who know what it takes to show up even on the hardest days.
