Thursday, August 19, 2010

Confidence

I was reading the other day about the difference between confidence and cockiness. I was planning a lengthy comment on the linked blog post, but after thinking about it a while I decided to post a new topic here, because this is a very interesting topic to me.

I can summarize my point very succinctly: when a nice person tries to act cocky it comes across as confidence. What behavior sets the confident person apart? Let's start a list:
  • Smiling
  • Observant
  • Sensitive
  • Polite
  • Interested
  • Sincere
  • Complimentary
What would you add? Tell me below, and I'll update the list!

Works Consulted
How to Have Confidence and Power in Dealing with People - Les Giblin
Skill with People - Les Giblin
How to Win Friends and Influence People - Dale Carnegie
www.doubleyourdating.com

3 comments:

  1. Cockiness is usually a mask for a total lack of self-confidence. A confident person would need to be sincere and honest.

    Honest with themselves first, about who they are - flaws and all. You can't really be confident if you haven't discovered where you can improve. Then a person can be honest with others.

    Which leads to being sincere. If they seem interested, it's because they are - not because they're pretending.

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  2. Sue, totally agree with you. One thing to add, although this is not a one word description, "the ability to add interesting content to a converstation. A confident person can add to a converstation, where as a cocky person takes over the conversation.

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  3. Michael, I see my comment didn't post the other day. I love your suggestion. I'm bouncing around ideas on how best to incorporate it in the list. I may have to break certain words: conversant, comfortable, interesting, interested, etc. into separate posts. And I was worried I'd run out of topics... :)

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