Confidence is a set of habits

This is an audio course. Thank you for listening. Could you maybe tell us what's maybe the most surprising and fascinating discovery you've made about confidence and having it and finding it and not having it? So when I started out, I definitely thought that confidence was something kind of out there that some people had. And I would -- when I was training as an actor, I would look at people and you'd see that he had it and she had it, and I knew that I didn't. But 20 years on, I know when I see those people that just really present, that just really in their bodies, that just able to stand to themselves when they have to. And I know that everybody can learn that skill. And that's been the big revelation for me, that confidence is not a birthright, it's a set of habits. And I wish I had known that at 23, 21, when I started work, even at 30, I wish I had known that. Confidence, oh, that's good. Not a birthright, a set of habits. Okay. And maybe for people who think that they're doing it, they're fine when it comes to speaking or being confident and having gravitas or a voice, could you just really lay it out for us in terms of what's at stake there, in terms of when you've got those habits sort of well developed and are rocking and rolling and cruising and firing on those cylinders versus when you're kind of stumbling and you haven't found your voice, what does it matter for the average professional? Gosh, Well, I know -- I've known those two zones. I've known the zone of not feeling confident really well as a person. And I know that when I didn't feel confident in myself, I wasted a lot of energy worrying what people thought about me. I would worry that I was speaking too fast. I would worry that my voice was too thin and I would worry that I didn't have enough presence. And that takes your attention away from other people. You stop listening. And of course, what makes people effective in their jobs is that they are present and listening and able to tune in and be empathetic to others pretty much in any job that you do. That's the success factor. And when you're worried about yourself, you don't have bandwidth to pay attention to other people.