Confidence is one of the biggest keys to happiness and success.

Low self-esteem can hinder your performance at work, affect your relationships, and generally make life more difficult than it has to be. Whereas a healthy dose of confidence can help you power through obstacles and achieve goals, both personal and professional.

If you are someone who occasionally struggles with low self-esteem – and who doesn’t? – then know this:

You can beat it.

People aren’t just born confident. Confidence is a skill that can be learned and developed. To help you do that, I’ve compiled a list of powerful techniques and strategies, proven to boost your mood, make you feel more confident, and radiate that confidence out to the world.

Try out a few of them and feel the difference it can make. Better yet, try all 10! Practice them often and I guarantee you will start feeling and acting more confident every day.

Look Good, Feel Great

Everyone likes to look good, to put their best foot forward. But more important than how good you look on the outside, is how good you feel on the inside. The good news is that by following these simple steps, you can both look your best and feel great about yourself.

Look out world!

1. Exercise

Of course regular exercise is key to staying healthy and physically fit, which is certainly an important part of our self-image. But studies have shown that a good work out also has mental and emotional benefits as well.

Physical exercise increases production of the body’s natural “feel good chemicals,” dopamine, serotonin and endorphins; as well as the brain building hormone BDNF. Which means that it improves your mood, memory and focus, while simultaneously reducing stress, anxiety and depression.

As if that wasn’t enough, exercise has also been shown to make people feel more confident, and capable of facing and completing difficult tasks.

Bottom line: if you’re not exercising regularly, you should be! It literally makes you healthier and smarter, and helps you both look and feel your very best.

2. Posture & Body Language

Every moment, whether we’re aware of it or not, we are communicating to the people around us via our posture and body language. The way we carry ourselves sends a silent message about how we feel, and whether we’re calm or nervous, shy or confident.

Standing up straight, with your head held high and your shoulders back, sends a message to the world: I am confident. I feel good.

But did you know that it also sends the same message to your brain, and your subconscious? In other words, assuming a confident posture can actually make you feel more confident. You can trick yourself into a different state of mind, by faking it until you really feel it. It’s the ultimate life hack.

Try out these power poses for an instant confidence booster. Pay attention to your body language, and work on maintaining good posture.

(By the way, exercise can help with that too!)

3. Get Dressed Up

Everyone knows to put on their A-game when going to a job interview, an important business meeting, or even out on a first date. You want to make a good impression, so you shower and shave, groom yourself, and put on your finest threads.

And not only do you look your best, but you feel your best, too.

Well you don’t have to save your best suit, or your little black dress, just for special occasions. You can get spiffed up anytime you need a confidence booster.

Next time you’re feeling down in the dumps, just start your day over. Take a hot shower and get cleaned up. Pick out your favorite outfit, the one that makes you feel like a million bucks. Get dressed to the nines, even if you aren’t going anywhere. Just walk around the house looking fantastic.

See if that doesn’t make you feel better almost immediately.

4. Smile

But if you really want to look and feel confident, the most important thing you can wear is your smile. Studies have found that smiling can actually make you feel happier – even when it’s fake, or forced.

Just like body language and power poses can influence how you feel, so too can your facial expressions. Your smile sends signals to your brain which decreases your stress level and make you feel better, happier and more confident.

And you might brighten up someone else’s day while you’re at it!

So, if you want a quick and easy way to boost your mood and your confidence, simply put on a smile. It doesn’t get any easier than that.

Quick & Easy Confidence Boosters

Apart from a regular exercise routine, good posture, and being sure to look your best, there are many other ways that you can boost your confidence. Here are some simple, quick and easy ways to kick start your self-esteem, anywhere, anytime.

5. Pump Up The Jams

One of the best ways to brighten your mood and elevate your spirits is by listening to music.

Music can have a profound affect on how we feel. It can help us to relax and let go of stress, or it can get us pumped up, motivated and ready to move. And most of us carry around our favorite songs with us on our smart phone. So wherever we go, they’re just a click away.

To make the most of the confidence-building power of music, choose something fun and upbeat, with positive, inspiring lyrics. Turn it up, close your eyes and lose yourself in the music. If you’re by yourself (or just unashamed) then sing it out loud.

Nod your head, tap your feet, move your body. Get up and dance! You’ll be amazed at how this can turn your whole day around, and leave you feeling like a champion. You’ll be uplifted, re-energized, and ready to take on the world.

It only takes a few minutes – and it’s fun!

6. Random Act of Kindness

Nothing can make you feel better about yourself, than going out of your way to something nice for someone else.

Studies show that being kind and generous to others has a whole slew of benefits for our own well-being. It makes us more compassionate and connected to those around us, helps us to be grateful for the things we have, and boosts our self-esteem by giving us a sense of meaning and purpose.

All of these things not only make us happier, but more confident, too.

So the next time you need a confidence booster, give this a try: call someone you haven’t spoken to in a while, just to tell them that you care; or pick a thoughtful little gift for your significant other; hold the door or the elevator for someone, compliment a coworker, or pay for a stranger’s latte.

It doesn’t have to be anything big. A random act of kindness, no matter how small, can make a huge difference in someone’s day – and give you a huge boost of confidence, too!

7. List the Things You Like About Yourself

Most of the time, low self-esteem is caused by our thoughts. We have a collection of faults, fears and negative thoughts running through our head on repeat, and it causes to feel bad about ourselves, and doubt what we are capable of.

The quickest way to correct this is to shift our focus to the positive.

Grab a pen and paper and start making a list of all the things you like about yourself. Write down all of your strengths, skills, talents, and best qualities. Don’t over-think it, just write down whatever comes to mind: funny, creative, good listener, make the world’s best lasagna… Write it all down!

This might seem a little corny at first glance, but don’t knock it til you try it! This practice is powerful, and it can silence your inner critic, and have you feeling on top of the world in no time flat.

Confidence Starts Within

We’ve covered several tips and “hacks” that can help you to look, feel and act more confident – things you can do today, and start seeing results right away.

Now it’s time to think long term.

Real, lasting confidence starts requires real inner work. You’ve got to release the fears, judgments and negativity that give rise to low self-esteem, and learn to love and accept yourself for who you are, deep down. You’ve got to change you habits, and your thoughts, and create a lifestyle that supports your personal development.

Are you ready for that? Good. Let’s get started…

8. Change Your “Self Talk”

Have you ever noticed that your mind just never shuts up? Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, there is an inner monologue that goes on all day long – a voice in your head that is always talking, a constant conversation you have with yourself.

Have you ever noticed just how much of that conversation is toxic and negative? How much time you spend judging and criticizing yourself? Stuff like, “I shouldn’t have said that, I’m so stupid.” Or, “I’ll never make it. I always find a way to screw up.”

No wonder we struggle with low self-esteem, with that nonsense running through our heads all the time!

Genuine confidence starts with re-writing that inner monologue. Scratch out all the negative, self-critical stuff and replace it with self-love and compassion. Take that list from #7 and internalize it. Train your mind to think only about how awesome you are, and how great your life is.

Because thoughts are creative. What you think, you become. So try and keep it positive!

9. Meditate Daily

Before you can change your thought patterns, you must first become aware of them. And the best way to do that is to go off by yourself, turn off all distractions, sit still, close your eyes, and do nothing.

Just watch. Listen. Feel.

Start a daily meditation practice, if you haven’t already. (Check out this post for an in-depth “how to” guide!) During your time in the silence, you will become intensely aware of your thoughts. Sometimes painfully so. But like I’ve said before, awareness is the first step to freedom!

Once you have identified the destructive thought patterns that underlie your self-esteem issues, you can start to dismantle them. Replace criticism with encouragement, and judgment with love and compassion.

Eventually, meditation can help you “detach” from your thoughts altogether. To move beyond the noise of the mind, and into the peaceful silence of pure awareness. To realize that you are not the thinker, you are not the mind – you are that peaceful, silent, pure awareness.

That deep, inner peace is the firm foundation upon which real confidence is built.

10. Practice Mindfulness

The breakthroughs we achieve in meditation can be applied to the rest of our lives, too. The inspiration, inner peace and confidence we find in our practice, we can take it out into the world.

In meditation we learn to free ourselves from the mind, and it’s compulsive stream of thoughts, judgments, criticisms, etc. We come to realize our spiritual wholeness, and find and feel our inner power, our infinite potential.

Through mindfulness, we learn to maintain that state of freedom and clarity in the midst of everyday activity.

Mindfulness is the practice of getting out of your head, and into the felt experience of the here and now; fully aware, fully immersed, fully present to your senses, to your body, to the fullness of the moment.

No longer identified with the voice in your head, the frightened little ego which feels cut off and separate from everyone and everything else. You are connected, at one with the universe, dancing and flowing with change as it happens.

No longer bound by crippling self-consciousness and petty fears, you are free to be yourself, to express yourself, fully and authentically. Infinite possibilities unfold before you. You can do anything.

This is the ultimate confidence.